0 0
Read Time:2 Minute, 33 Second

Manon, Royal Ballet, Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, Review

Lauren Cuthbertson makes her mark in her debut performance of Manon at the Royal Opera House.

4 out of 5 stars
Sergei Polunin as Des Grieux,  Lauren Cuthbertson as Manon at the Royal Opera House
Perfect: Sergei Polunin as Des Grieux, Lauren Cuthbertson as Manon at the Royal Opera House Photo: Alastair Muir

In 2009 the Royal Ballet principal Lauren Cuthbertson was diagnosed with glandular fever, which turned into agonisingly debilitating ME and necessitated not only an 18-month lay-off from the stage, but long periods of total physical incapacity.

She might never have danced again. In fact, she has returned to the stage, a different and more interesting ballerina, one determined to fulfil her ambition to perform the most challenging roles in the balletic repertoire.

And as challenges go, Kenneth MacMillan’s Manon is up there with the best of them. His three-act interpretation of the Abbé Prévost’s tragic novel is not so much the story of virginal innocence corrupted but of a voracious minx foiled. Manon may be on her way to a convent when we first see her, but she is never in any doubt about the power her beauty grants her in the world, and her treatment of the adoring student Des Grieux, whom she abandons for the jewels and furs offered by a rich protector, is little short of scandalous.

The trick is not only to negotiate the intricate swoops and entanglements of MacMillan’s evocative choreography, which sees Manon constantly passed from man to man like an expensive bauble, but also to make you care about this calculating, irrational heroine.

On her debut, Cuthbertson makes her mark. This is a wonderfully detailed performance, a carefully charted journey from girlish tease to enraptured lover to hard-bitten courtesan and finally to heart-broken and dying waif. She makes you so conscious of Manon’s love of luxury, her longing for the good life, that you understand her rash decisions even if you don’t sympathise with them. Her dancing is sumptuous but careful; there is a tiny bit of abandon lacking.

Her Des Grieux, however, is another matter. Sergei Polunin’s extreme youth makes him perfect for the dewy-eyed dreamer who throws his life away in thrall to Manon’s beauty. When we first see him in a big hat, with clumsy, out-turned feet, he is almost comically the innocent abroad. Then, as the role takes hold, the sheer purity of his movement in the lingering solos and impassioned pas de deux enables him powerfully to express his character’s ardour and despair.

Together, the couple find emotion in unexpected places, not in the big duets, but in the party scene, for example. The moment when Des Grieux pours out his disgust and despair at his love’s behaviour has rarely been more powerful. With wonderful support from Gary Avis as a particularly vulpine Monsieur GM and Jos Martin in ferociously sharp form as the conniving Lescaut, this is an evening to relish.

In repertoire until November 26

Happy
Happy
0 %
Sad
Sad
0 %
Excited
Excited
0 %
Sleepy
Sleepy
0 %
Angry
Angry
0 %
Surprise
Surprise
0 %
Previous post Sergei Goes To Cuba 2009
Next post Three Years Ago Today, The World Met Sergei
%d bloggers like this: