My reaction to Alice's Adventures in Wonderland at the ballet’s première, on this same stage, over six years ago, was no more than two muted cheers, cautiously delivered. 50 performances further on, a more considered, longer-term judgement is that those cheers now extend to three and are much louder.
Christopher Wheeldon has refined and shaped his ballet into a classic that remains loyal to the timeless fantasy created by Lewis Carroll (Charles Dodgson). The various minor revisions since the ballet’s last revival, such as the brief and sudden ticker tape parade of dancers in the aisles, all add to its curious charm.
The biggest alteration from that world première is to have grown an extra act and – structurally – this three-act version is now superbly paced. We rightly praise Wheeldon for his characterful, expressive and romantic choreography and his directorial skill is masterful in terms of maintaining momentum, which builds through a series of well-paced sprints, rather than the dull consistency of a marathon. This version of Alice has a pleasing structure, treating narrative, dance, comedy and design as equal bedfellows in a work that is now so much improved because of the balanced sum of these parts. A prologue and epilogue cleverly depicts Carroll’s “real world” inspirations for his Wonderland fantasy.
The ballet’s success owes much to Bob Crowley’s set and costume designs, which are lovingly authentic to the imagery of Charles Dodgson’s illustrations, and yet also bear an innovative edge that brings Wonderland, vividly and excitingly, to life. This mix of innovation and authenticity is best exemplified by the magnificent creation of the Cheshire cat. The grinning face is instantly recognisable from Dodgson’s super-large feline sitting on a tree branch and the animal’s ability to appear and disappear at will is assimilated by the cat being a giant disaggregated puppet, its various body parts manipulated in ‘black theatre’ style. Cowley’s costume designs are all spot-on, modern interpretations of Dodgson’s imagery from the flamingo ballerinas, with their arms doubling as the wading bird’s long, winding neck and head, to the Queen of Hearts’ blood-red, mobile gown; her bored husband, lodging within, reading his newspaper!
Lauren Cuthbertson reprised her creation of the title role, from the 2011 première, which she also premiered just a couple of weeks’ ago, dancing on the other side of the world, with the Australian Ballet. Fresh from that Antipodean success, Cuthbertson again achieved an engaging potpourri of the essential characteristics of Carroll’s ‘loving, gentle and wildly curious’ heroine. Dodgson also wrote that Alice has ‘the eager enjoyment of Life that comes only in the happy hours of childhood (we should not forget that his Alice was seven at the time of her adventure down the rabbit hole), when all is new and fair, and when Sin and Sorrow are but names…’.