Romeo and Juliet has become a staple for almost all major ballet companies around the globe. Set in Verona in the 1400s, Shakespeare’s tale of doomed, young lovers from feuding noble families, has all the right elements for a large-scale ballet production. Dutch National Ballet’s version, choreographed in 1967 by Rudi van Dantzig, checks the right boxes, showcasing the company’s breadth of talent.
With its majestic set design and lush period costumes both by Toer van Schayk, the grandeur of the company was on full display on Sunday’s matinée. However, the production falters somewhat under its own dramaturgy.
Principal dancer Anna Ol portrayed Juliet with pristine articulation and soloist Jan Spunda gave a solid performance as Romeo. His elongated frame and supple landings provided Romeo with a prince-like innocence and easy charm. This complemented Ol’s delicate yet deliberate Juliet; her every gesture embodying a sense of purity. Both Ol and Spunda’s balcony and bedroom pas de deux were masterfully executed. Like many of his contemporaries at the time, van Dantzig has peppered these two iconic pas de deux with elaborate partnering and bold lifts. If there were any hiccups they were completely imperceptible. Ol is such the quintessential ballerina, her complete command of her physique almost seems like she could just as easily have partnered herself.
While the love story between Romeo and Juliet shines throughout, van Dantzig gives fair billing to the male roles. Vsevolod Maievskyi as Tybalt was both perfectly bad-tempered and brutish and Tristan Simpson portrayed a sympathetic Paris with self-assured partnering skills. Both dancers seem cut from the same cloth with their long legs and pure lines. They seem equally poised to be future Romeos in years to come. Joseph Massarelli’s Mercutio was heartily executed and Edo Wijnen portrayed Benvolio with a touch of sweetness. Honourable mention goes to fencing instructor Youval Kuipers for making the sword fighting sequences dazzle with crisp intent.
Some of the most striking parts of the ballet were performed by the company’s ensemble. After a momentary prologue that introduces the ballet’s main characters, the stage is brightly lit to display a bustling town square. The students from the professional and pre-professional programme of the Dutch National Ballet Academy held their own, weaving amongst the corps de ballet members and causing choreographed mischief and joy that delighted the audience with a vibrant intergenerational tapestry of village life.
The street girls, danced with bravado by Lore Zonderman and Nina Tripoli, gave the village scenes a extra dose of panache and the pas de six of four women and two men in the second act, jolted me like a shot of espresso with their quick footwork and boundless leaps. I thought the double tours into a split in jump from the diagonal were particularly well executed by the men. The exceptional group work performed by the six dancers certainly merited artist credits in the programme liner.
While the production was buoyed by confident dancing and stylised acting – Floor Eimers showed her range as the regal Lady Capulet while Kira Hilli’s Nurse was a loving confidante with some comedic flair – van Dantzig’s Romeo and Juliet did have some peculiarities. On the morning of Juliet’s wedding to Paris, after she drinks the poison, the bridesmaids' dance is shrouded in such darkness from the stage lighting that it made me think of the Willis from Giselle. An appropriate comparison yet still one that momentarily took me out of the story. Moreover, in van Dantzig’s version, Juliet is haunted by the deaths of Tybalt and Mercutio who later come back as dancing spectres. In the end, the two ghostly figures envelop the star-crossed lovers, covering their motionless bodies with their black capes. It’s an interesting psychological twist that rendered the ending less intimate and thus, made me question its narrative purpose.
Nonetheless, van Dantzig’s Romeo and Juliet is in good hands with the Dutch National Ballet and is undoubtedly a defining work for the company. If the production has any shortcomings, the Sunday matinée audience didn't seem to think so judging from the rousing standing ovation.
