THE GöTEBORG BALLET

AURORA GERMAN TOUR 2007

SLEEPING BEAUTY AS MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM
(…) In the quirky choreography for ‘Aurora’ by Meryl Tankard, formerly soloist with Pina Bausch and successful choreographer for the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games, amongst others, the Gothenburg Ballet dancers expertly tap-dance to strains of Tchaikovsky, the bad fairy comes flying through the air as smoking witch, held by ropes, and the roses in the castle garden are replaced by cabbages.
(…) We see giant shadows behind a white screen, couples finding and fleeing each other. Then a starry sky in front of which the dancers can only bee seen in the dark of night due to the four small, glimmering lights attached to their ankles and wrists – pyrotechnics of movement. Three black cats with masks conjure up a tingling sensation of cool eroticism as vamps.
(…) And when the time for the kiss comes, it does not signify the deliverance of a poor princess, but two self-confident partners testing and finding each other. One of the quietest scenes, and a very touching one.
(…) Deftly danced by a young ensemble with infectious enthusiasm, this piece of dance theatre, which often brings to mind the dreamy, colourful and also disturbing world of Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream, is like imaginative fireworks.
Mannheimer Morgen, 11 January 2007

SWEDES TRANSFORM FAIRY-TALE INTO MEANINGFUL DANCE THEATRE
(…) As clumsily grotesque the first part, as dreamlike and joyous the second, which leads through a hundred years of sleep. In a long shadow play behind a white screen couples are dancing – giddiness, escape, writhing, closeness, devotion. In front of a black velvet curtain the dreams continue: dancing spots of light, prone exotic creatures, Aurora doing oriental dance. Suddenly there are four real, contemporary couples, Aurora wakes from her dream fantasies and moves towards a man, they look at and find each other in a kiss.
Christel Voith, Schwäbische Zeitung, 15 January 2007

A PARTING OF THE WAYS OVER THIS SLEEPING BEAUTY
(…) ‘Aurora – Sleeping Beauty as never seen before’, promised the Gothenburg Ballet at the well-attended Graf Zeppelin Haus on Friday, and it was truly presented imaginatively and with a sparkle. It really is a Sleeping Beauty we’ve never seen before in this way. Extraordinary: choice of music, variation of content, dance concept, composition and not least Meryl Tankard’s demanding choreography and the homogenous effort by the 15-strong ensemble.
Brigitte Geiselhart, Südkurier, 15 January 2007

CLUMSY PRINCES
(…) A picturesque stage set with little castle and French-style garden welcomes the audience (set design and costumes: also Meryl Tankard). But the pretty flowerbeds with cabbages already betray the fact that the story of Sleeping Beauty told here might run differently from the familiar fairy-tale books of childhood. Tankard, formerly a soloist with Pina Bausch, investigates the dreams of fairy-tale princes in this ‘Aurora’, first premiered in 1994, while caricaturing clichés and focusing on what is essential. With a lot of conviction the company stages disparaging slapstick sequences as well as a fine dance aesthetic.
(…) The extremely pared-down scenery after the interval comes across as all the more breathtaking: various pas de deux, composed as moving silhouettes on a screen, which increase in dynamics and density while artfully playing with the possibility of making bodies appear either dwarflike or giant. Modern string ostinati accompany this with musical impulses.
(…) The key to this scurrilous confusion is the scene where Aurora and her prince very slowly come together on a street of light, and circle around each other, discovering the mind, heart and nether regions of the other. Their Hollywood-proof kiss is not the end, yet, however. The finale belongs to the limping gardeners and exalted women: people with visible faults becoming radiant couples like the princess and her prince – without needing the kiss of life.
Gabriele Müller, Stuttgarter Zeitung, 16 January 2007

SLEEPING BEAUTY WITHOUT THE STING
First fun, then passion, first laughter, then love: if it was always that easy! Meryl Tankard’s sensational dance work ‘Aurora’ is characterized by strong contrasts and a development that is fractured. For the Australian choreographer, the template of Tchaikovsky’s ‘Sleeping Beauty’ is just a starting point for an update which very quickly takes on its own life, possibly finding its best moments this way.
Rapturous applause then for the 15-strong Gothenburg Ballet, which is performing three sold-out shows of ‘Aurora’ at the Fürth Theatre (last show today). In the first part, the dancers mime the droll staff at Sleeping Beauty’s castle using all kinds of humoristic devices; the limping gardeners, the pretentious but rather wayward princes and the cute, tap-dancing elves – semi-naked, with colourful tutus and little wings. The classic narrative ballet, conjured up and retold – including bad witch – with irony. Children would love it.
After the interval, Tankard, formerly a Pina Bausch student, homes in on the adults: this is contemporary dance theatre, alluring with its graceful shadow play silhouettes, circus-style aerial work, stars shimmering in the dark. But also with its intimate, unembellished coupling at the end. A modern-day fairy-tale.
Wolf Ebersberger, Nürnberger Zeitung, 19 January 2007

THE PARADE OF THE PRINCELY IDIOTS
(…) Australian Meryl Tankard, who has worked with Pina Bausch for six years, took apart the classical original and lovingly put it together again. What she deemed as usable and contemporary could stay. The result is far from a hotchpotch, however – it is a rather serious investigation of longing and the search for love. And where does it say that a little irony and a subtle dose of sarcasm don’t go a long way to lighten things a bit?
The choreographer approached the music selection with similar openness: Tchaikovsky can be heard of course, but also Robert Moran or John Lurie. This works surprisingly well and is admirably imaginative, just as the entire piece. For Tankard manages to create new images by means of ideas that are ingenious because – once you get it – they are so obvious.
As if that in itself wasn’t fabulous enough, the ensemble on stage dances with a freshness and enthusiasm suggesting the piece premiered the day before and everything is still completely new and outrageously exciting.
We should take it as a sign that the wonderful Aurora (Anna Herrmann) does end up finding The One (Jerôme Delbey). Who needs princes if there are men like this?
Sabine Rempe, Fürther Nachrichten, 19 January 2007

ATTACK THE MALE GO
Choreographer Meryl Tankard exposes gender conventions in their most exquisite silliness in the full-length ballet based on “The Sleeping Beauty.“ It was created in 1994 for the Meryl Tankard Australian Dance Theatre and is now performed by the Gothenburg Opera Ballet, a company that does the witty choreography full credit.
“Aurora“ was created in Australia, and Tankard’s stage set reflects the fairy world of the British tradition. These fairies are a bunch of whimsical beings of both sexes whose main object in life is getting up to fun japes such as turning into fireflies at festive occasions (Act II). Especially the male fairies, dressed in brightly coloured tutus, excel in good humoured impishness in a quite irresistible way. Perhaps that is the reason why Tankard felt induced to make the part which is inspired by the original divertissement a bit too long – but it is sure is entertaining.
Tankard moves Aurora from the palace into the garden, which quite soon turns into a fair(y)ground lit with brightly coloured paper lanterns. The ballet is constantly moving through different dimensions: the real world, the fairy world and a metaphysical dimension – the World of Love. In this dimension, woman and man are united after having passed through a maze created in a typical Tankard manner: a full size silhouette dance – a clever transformation of the Search scene originally set in a thorn-brake.
This time it is Princess Aurora (Anandi Vinken) who does the searching instead of waiting to be awakened by a man. In fact, the ballet opens to her waking up in a beautiful misty stage set – a symbolic coming to awareness. Vinken has the necessary sensitivity and sensuality to be able to create a vibrant vision of a girl-just-turned-woman, but she also infuses Aurora with a strength that keeps her on top of things.
For a successful remake of a classic, the choreographer has to be able to relate to the original, and this is definitely the case in “Aurora.“ In the key scene of the ballet – the Rose Adagio – Tankard shows her mastery as well as her audacity. This is one of the few scenes where Tankard keeps to the original Tchaikovsky score, which emits a strong emotional tension in combination with “the choice“. But Tankard turns the tables on the suitors, who are subjected to thorough scrutiny, down to an hands-on inspection of their “crown jewels“ by their bride-to-be, a ritual which is repeated in the prenuptial scene where Aurora confirms her choice of the “Ugly Prince“ (a strange name for the gracedful Tyler Gledhill who could double for Orlando Bloom).
A ballet comedy is a rare thing and a ballet with such a clear feminist approach as “Aurora“ is even rarer. “Aurora“ is a very successful attack on the inflated male ego – which through humour identifies it as something quite ridiculous.
Lena Andrén, ballettanz 12/06

SLEEPING BEAUTY IN SEARCH OF A DATE
(…) the new piece based on the famous Sleeping Beauty material, entitled ‘Aurora’, caused much laughter, frequent clapping and a warm final applause at the Ludwigshafen performance… In a crafty shadow play full of surprising effects the silhouettes of the princes double and treble, enlarge and disappear unexpectedly – a crafty game with perceptions, where nothing is as its seems.
(…) Again and again, couples find each other in the second part, until a comical number at the end reveals that only 15 excellent performers of the Gothenburg Ballet had slipped into all the different costumes.
Isabelle von Neumann-Cosel, Rheinpfalz, 11. January 2007

BRAUTSCHAU IM GEMüSEGARTEN
Wir befinden uns offenbar an der Loire: im Hintergrund die klassische Front eines Schlosses, im Vordergrund ein gepflegter französischer Ziergarten, die Gewächse wie Soldaten in Reih und Glied. Doch handelt es sich bei diesen Gewächsen nicht um Blumen oder andere Zierpflanzen, sondern um Blumenkohl, Salat und Kohlköpfe, die aus dem vorgetäuschten Lust- einen Gemüsegarten machen. Natürlich gehört zu einem solchen Garten das entsprechende Landvolk. Kaum hat Prinzessin Aurora im Zentrum der geometrisch angelegten Gartenwege ein kurzes, introvertiertes Gastspiel gegeben, wird der Garten von denen besetzt, die ihn bearbeiten: tölpelhafte, zum Teil hinkende Landwirtschaftsgehilfen mit ihren Schubkarren und mit aufdringlicher Bravour – eine handvoll simpler Gemüter, die die Gelegenheit zu einem großen Auftritt beim Schopfe fassen.

Doch es kommt noch besser. Bald werden sich die Tölpel vom Land, samt ihren Frauen, in Peter Tschaikowskys und Marius Petipas Feen verwandeln, die einem erwachsenen Dornröschen ihre Aufwartung machen. Gekleidet in Tüll und Flitter, schmücken sie den Gemüseziergarten mit Lampions, und ihre Segenswünsche für die Prinzessin gießen sie in groteske Tanznummern.

Barfuß hüpfen die Männer daher als vervielfältigte Pucks eines makaberen Sommernachtstraum. Dagegen sind die weiblichen Feen anscheinend auf dem Broadway zuhause. Als Revuegirls klacken sie steppend ihren eigenen Rhythmus in die Musik; der metallische Akzent ihrer Tänze verbindet sich harmonisch mit der Musik von Tschaikowsky, die die Aufführung in dieser Szene zum erstenmal verwendet.

Tankard, die in den siebziger und achtziger Jahren eine der führenden Solistinnen in Pina Bauschs Tanztheater Wuppertal gewesen ist, erzählt die alte Geschichte von der verwunschenen Prinzessin Aurora und ihrem hundertjährigen Schlaf. In der Wiedergabe der Fabel bleibt sie nah am Original. In der dramaturgischen Strukturierung des Stückes und in der Choreographie aber leistet sie sich größere Freiheiten.

Das berühmte Rosen-Adagio macht Tankard wie Petipa zu einer Parade der Prinzen, die um Aurora werben. Doch sind bei ihr die Prinzen zu Figuren aus Comicheften und anderen Märchen geworden. Einer der Prinzen hüpft wie ein Frosch; ein anderer trägt einen dicken Bauch vor sich her, den er zu Beginn seiner Solovariation demonstrativ abschnallt; keiner der Prinzen entspricht dem Schönheitsideal des klassischen Balletts. Aurora prüft jeden von ihnen ernsthaft, ehe der Fluch der bösen Fee die Darsteller nacheinander in ein unruhiges Koma sinken läßt. Prüfend legt sie jedem die Hand auf Stirn, Brust und Geschlecht; dann läßt sie sie vortanzen, was sie am besten können. Es werden durchweg komische Nummern von großer Virtuosität.

Meryl Tankards Aurora besteht aus zwei Akten von je einer Stunde. Der erste zielt vor allem auf die Lachmuskeln der Zuschauer; er ist in weiten Teilen großes tänzerisches Kabarett mit einem sehr eigenwilligen, skurrilen Humor.

Den zweiten Akt geht die Choreographin wesentlich ernsthafter an. Den hunderjährihen Schlaf zeigt sie als raffiniertes Schattenspiel, das die Umrisse zunächst der männlichen, dann aber auch der weiblichen Tänzer in zunehmend schnellerem Tempo auf eine weiße Leinwand projiziert, getragen von Musik von John Lurie und Robert Moran.

Das Schattenspiel leitet über in einen rasenden Frauentanz, reiner Taumel der Sinne und der Körper, der wiederum von einer ganz stillen Szene abgelöst wird. Auf leerer Bühne kommen Aurora und ihr Prinz, in Straßenkleidern von heute, über die große Bühnendiagonale aufeinander zu, während die verbleibenden Gruppen der Frauen und Männer die andere Diagonale besetzt halten: ein so simples wie eindringliches Ritual, dessen Spannung sich am Ende im Kuß löst.

Fürs große Schlußdivertissement, nun wieder mit Tschaikowskys Musik, kehrt die Aufführung noch einmal zu den Rüpelszenen des ersten Teils zurück, um sie im Pas de deux der Blauen Vögel grandios zu überhöhen. Noch einmal produzieren sich die Feen; diesmal als Zirkusartisten. Und als Höhepunkt solcher Zirkuskünste schwingen sich die Blauen Vögel buchstäblich in die Luft. Meryl Tankard hat Petipa beim Wort genommen. Den Pas de deux der Blauen Vögel choreographiert sie, mit Hilfe einer ausgeklügelten Maschinerie, als grandiose Flugnummer, aufregender als alles, was man unter dem „Blue Birds“-Etikett je auf der Ballettbühne gesehen hat.
Das letzte Wort freilich haben die Landleute, die die Aufführung aus der Phantasiewelt des Märchens in eine groteske Realität zurückbringen, ohne die Erinnerung an die Ernsthaftigkeit der Suche nach Liebe und Gemeinsamkeit völlig wegzublenden.

Ein Ballett hat sich unter Meryl Tankards feinfühligen Händen in ein aufregendes Stück Tanztheater verwandelt. Die Choreographie baut auf den traditionellen Vorgaben auf und benutzt, wenn auch häufig mit spöttisch-sarkastischem Unterton, was ihr vom Überlieferten verwendbar erscheint. Von Liebe, Erotik und Partnersuche aber handelt sie mindestens so ernsthaft, wie es Tschaikowsky und Petipa taten. Allerdings mit völlig anderen, heutigen Mitteln.
Jochen Schmidt, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 12. Juli 1996

A show with this much innovation and energy was a joy to watch and a pleasure to be given the opportunity to see.
Paul McIntyre, 1996

In Aurora, Tankard has done what all good storytellers do. She has taken a narrative and added her own inimitable magic to entertain, enchant and illuminate.
Anne Slaney, 1996

There are magical moments throughout Arora, from twinkling fairy lights to exotic Eastern veiled allure and bare chested masculine mock bravado. The exploration of sexes, their love/hate relationships, and, of course, the tale of Sleeping Beauty all interleave in Aurora, a joyous dance cartoon with a deeply passionate subtext.

Quotations of the worls of circus, modern dance, jazz dance and tap rub shoulders and tutus with each other.
Michael Morley, The Financial Review

Aurora is a work of genius ... perfect bodies do exist, are unbeleivably wonderful and move unter Tankard’s direction, like very heaven. It has the stamp of her teasing, manipulative choreographic character and generosity when it comes to providing, sheer enjoyment. It’s a long time since I’ve heard sustained laughter (in the right places) at dance.
Shirley Stott Despoja, The Adelaide Review 1994

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