After hosting Les Miserables over the Christmas season, the Bord Gáis Energy Theatre is welcoming another spectacle of 20th century British culture. Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake returns to the stage, reimagined for the 21st century. The week long run will welcome a male led ensemble, reinvigorating the production that made ballet history.
Debuting in London in 1995, the original production took the West End by storm. Bourne’s decision to replace the female corps-de-ballet with a male ensemble to play the menacing swans turned the show on its head and proved an immense success. The success of the production soon became global, and is to-date the longest-running ballet in Broadway history. Now, almost 24 years later, the production is reviving the original set elements, costumes and choreography, as it embarks on a UK and Ireland tour.
The ballet flipped the classic ballet on its head in various ways. By replacing the corps-de-ballet with a male ensemble, it already challenged the concept of the original ballet. Bourne went even further, with the love story played between two men for the first time in a major production of the ballet, yielding critical acclaim from both audiences and critics alike. His reinterpretation went in line with directors of the day. From Nicholas Hytner’s Carousel and Bobbie Walter’s revival of Chicago, conventions were broken on both sides of the Atlantic.
Bourne has a deep rooted theatricality, never limiting himself to the world of ballet. He has lent his talents to the National Theatre on multiple occasions and worked alongside former Creative Director Richard Eyre in the creation of Mary Poppins, the game changing musical slated for its first West End revival later this year. His transcendence through mediums is one of the primary reasons why Bourne is the respected artist he is today.
The original Swan Lake production went on to win awards for Best Choreography and Best Direction of a Musical at the 1999 Tony Awards in New York, and now Irish audiences can experience the historic production for a reasonable price at the Bord Gáis Energy Theatre. Works of this inventive nature are few and far between, and often define a generation. There is no questioning Bourne’s Swan Lake place in the history books. It continues to defy conventions and smash expectations almost a quarter of a century after its first performance.
