Review: Matthew Bourne’s The Red Shoes, Hippodrome

Matthew Bourne returned to Bristol with his cinematic epic The Red Shoes, first performed here in 2017, and it had the Hippodrome on its feet. This is ballet with its buttons undone.

The Red Shoes is a Shakespeare-esque play-within-a-play, equally as tragic, with a terrific set-within-a-set to match. You are immediately hit square between the ears with Bernard Herrmann’s stunning score, and the projections by Duncan McLean take your breath away.  Along with the delicious costumes, it’s a time capsule of the golden age.

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Bourne’s unique selling point is how he employs and utilises the grace of the male dancer. We’ve seen this time and again from him, such as in his take on Swan Lake. But all of Bourne’s New Adventures dancers seem to fly and float – you do not hear a single foot hit the stage floor, unless for punctuation. The choreography is fast and exquisite – company rehearsals must be endless, and they must have vast associative memories to master that much footwork. These dancers are at the very top of their game, and the affect is mesmerising.

Matthew Bourne’s The Red Shoes. Photo by Johan Persson

The Red Shoes is satirical, comedic, dark and ambitious all at once.  The hilarious lip-curled loathing in the opening scene sets the stage for the theme of women’s choices, or lack of them.

It is also a satire of the brutal ballet world, and the sacrifices one must make for the love of dance.  I’m sure Bourne’s dancers themselves have made a few of these to get where they are.

We feel the characters deeply, a testament to the storytelling power Bourne demands.  The composer, our heroine’s love interest, is a lovely character, and beautifully played by Dominic North that night. The two principle dancers in the story, this time played by Liam Mower and Michaela Meazza, are also fantastic.  In a tremendous moment Micheala’s Irina limps off en point, opening up the vacuum for our heroine Victoria to step in and realise her ambition.  This is a key turning point in the story.

But as with many of the key points in the story, the set change to the next scene is so rapid that it jolts us from the storyline into something polar opposite, a jarring but fantastic technique: The brutal rehearsal scenes are pitched against the wild cast party scenes, which bring in tango and lindy hop. The dark, silhouetted, stunning portrayal of Vicky choosing the red shoes and therefore her fate is pitched against suddenly finding ourselves at the beach in Monte Carlo with beach balls and muscle men. The key moment where Vicky chooses love over her career is immediately pitched against two farcical Egyptians in gumboots.  Reality versus parody in the blink of an eye.

Matthew Bourne’s THE RED SHOES. Cordelia Braithwaite ‘Victoria Page’ and The Company. Photo by Johan Persson

The performance is pristine, even down to the curtain call.  We learn that the greatest stars shine brightly but only for a short while.  I hope this is not the case for lead dancer Cordelia Braithwaite who will undoubtedly delight audiences for a long time to come.

The Red Shoes will be at Bristol Hippodrome from Tuesday March 3 until Saturday March 7, 2020, touring until June 6 after that.  For more information and to book tickets, visit new-adventures.net/the-red-shoes

Read more: Bristol 24/7’s interview with New Adventures dancer Liam Mower

Main image: Glenn Graham as ‘Grischa Ljubov’. Photo by Johan Persson