The Australian Ballet’s production of Christopher Wheeldon’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, is cinematic, fun, comedic, and rule-breaking. It’s the best of cross-generational storytelling: a bit like an animated children’s movie that also speaks to adults. Accessible, joyful and magical (there’s even dancing in the aisles, for the full immersive experience), but with inside jokes for the grown-ups. It’s powerful enough to both entertain and connect on a deeper, darker level.
Given its first production was more than ten years ago, it’s common for reviews to note that Alice borders on dance entertainment. It’s true that Alice incorporates other forms of theatre and design, with the clever use of digital projections (Jon Driscoll and Gemma Carrington), some truly impressive puppetry – such as a grinning, extensible Cheshire cat (Toby Olié) – and a set and costume design that’s so adventurous and boundary-pushing it could justify its own visual art installation. There’s life-size paper boats for transport, an art deco projection of Alice’s tears, some sassy ambulant triangular trees and to quote my guest “a lot of fun things falling from the ceiling” – including a huge, red axe. To back it all up, Joby Talbot has created a unique and nuanced score that veers towards a musical or film soundtrack.
But even with all the theatrical hustle and bustle, the production strips right back at times, with touching solos and moments of quiet dignity from both Sharni Spencer as Alice and Jarryd Madden as the Knave. Given the central theme of loneliness in the Alice in Wonderland story, these solitary numbers are both essential and beautifully executed. Spencer is a technically accomplished dancer who fills the stage with breezy jumps, elegant arabesques and smooth pirouettes. In the mock trial scene, even against a background of eccentric characters, Madden brings us back to the power and emotion of quality movement, with his eloquent plea to the Queen of Hearts for his life.
Then there are the company sections, which burst with colour, wit, and detail, including a caterpillar constituted from dozens of willowy dancers’ legs, a pastel flower bed of ballerinas, the most articulate worm you’ve ever seen and a corps de ballet of playing cards. And under David Hallberg’s direction, what a crisp deck of cards the Australian Ballet currently is – with movements that are both creative and clockwork precise, and dancing that’s energised, technical and world-class.
Despite being drawn from Lewis Carroll’s classic children’s book, this production isn’t all kids’ play. In Wheeldon’s retelling, Alice is a teenager and it fittingly flirts with adolescent themes, like love, ostracism and abandonment. The production doesn’t shy away from the obvious psychedelic influences, dimension shifts and dark undercurrents of the original story; you can’t accuse this Alice of not committing to its full lunatic potential. At one point, our heroine discharges a firearm (the licensing status of which is unclear) in a public square and it goes off like a social faux pas, shattering the fragile connections she’s only just made; another guttural kitchen scene contained a deranged cook, a sacrificial pig baby and, as my guest noted, arguably an “excessive amount of disembowelling.”
Intestines aside, a marker of success in a ballet is when it provides a platform to see an entirely different side of a dancer. In this production, that dancer is Ako Kondo as the Queen of Hearts. We love a despotic, unstable, homicidal Queen and Kondo fits the bill with aplomb. Given that ballet can be so elitist and intimidating, it’s a huge relief when it sends itself up. Wheeldon’s parody of the famous Rose Adage from Sleeping Beauty, with Kondo at the helm, is a masterclass in this. She’s deliciously evil, all sweeping arms and melodramatic épaulement, at one stage sliding into a full split, then – maintaining that position – half-swimming, half-humping her way to the feet of a terrified, hapless man, to demand he feed a sweet directly into her mouth.
In the original version of the Rose Adage – which is serious, technical ballet – no matter how adept the ballerina, the section is always laced with an edge-of-your-seat tension around the effort of our leading lady not falling down (extended balances en pointe while courting multiple suitors and trying to look effortless will have that effect). Though stunning, the audience is acutely aware of the potential for public (and vicarious) embarrassment. In Wheeldon’s parody version, ‘The Tart Adage,’ he grants the audience permission to fall, right down the rabbit hole, then roll around on the ground laughing, legs akimbo, scoffing a jam tart.
Alice gives the audience a hall pass not to take ballet so seriously, and for that reason alone, it’s a fantastic entry point to the craft. It’s more than an entry point, though: it’s a surreal, tongue-in-cheek, poignant romp, marrying playful, clever family-friendly entertainment with the best of The Australian Ballet.
