Romeo & Juliet – Moscow City Ballet

Chichester’s stage seemed made for this drama, grand yet intimate. Prokofiev’s popular score was brilliantly realised by Igor Shavruk’s small orchestra. The choreography really needed to shine to match such music, and so it did. Laughter and delight mixed with real passion and pain. Except in the love scene, Mercutio (Artem Minakov, a comic star) and Tybalt (Talgat Kozhabaev, both powerful and tender) ruled the first two acts.

Then they died, and the lovers (Liliya Orekhova and Daniil Orlov) delivered real tragedy. His mad grief, her limp body, spectral dance “en pointe” and silent scream of anguish were a triumph!

Chichester Festival Theatre, 3 January 2012

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