Northern Ballet's Beauty and the Beast - Leeds Grand Theatre - The Reviews Hub (2024)

Director and Choreographer: David Nixon CBE

Conductor: Daniel Parkinson

There’s something comforting about a traditional ballet. While adaptations of modern media are fun and innovative (such as Matthew Bourne’s recent Edward Scissorhands revival, or the ongoing tour of Peaky Blinders by Rambert Dance) and contemporary adaptations of classics breathe new life into old stories (as in Bourne’s Romeo and Juliet), Northern Ballet are always reliable when it comes to putting on exactly what you expect, with tulle and tutus in abundance, and having an audience walk away as breathless as the dancers.

Beauty and the Beast very much lives up to this standard. The story is taken back to the original fairy tale, starting with the transformation of a narcissistic Prince into a Beast when he insults the wrong fairy. Elsewhere, Beauty and her two vain sisters are living with their Father, and unexpectedly fall on hard times. When the Father goes looking for work, he stumbles into the seemingly abandoned castle of The Beast, trying to take a beautiful rose he sees blooming there as a gift for his favourite daughter. The Beast demands Beauty as payment for the insult. Over the coming days and weeks, they fall in love and The Beast transforms back into the Prince he once was. As the Disney film says, it’s a tale as old as time.

Ballet can be hard to follow story wise due to the nature of telling the plot purely through movement, but even for someone not familiar with the fairy tale this adaptation would be easy to parse. The choreography by the wonderful David Nixon flows from scene to scene without any set piece outstaying it’s welcome. He doesn’t overuse the chorus as is often an issue in ballet (indeed the only full company dance is the finale wedding). Little touches, like the repeated petulant double stamp of the sisters or the almost clockwork bobbing of the servants give real insight into the characters and who they are. This is especially evident in The Beast (Harris Beattie in this performance), whose animalistic movements are fascinating to watch (also it is entirely unfair how Beattie can just jump four feet upwards with seemingly no effort). Contrasting him excellently is the wonderfully soft dancing of Beauty (Saeka Shirai). She is grace personified even as she rejects the initial advances of Beattie’s Beast. Watching the pair fall in love and truly believing it is what ballet is all about.

The beauty of this ballet is not just in the dancing, however. David Nixon’s costumes are a mix of waterfalling fabric and starched stiffness that really emphasise the fairy tale unreality of the world while showing off the dancer’s bodies and movements. The Beast’s ugliness is shown by accentuating the strength of his legs and back, rather than by heavy prosthetics, and really emphasises the animalistic nature of the character without compromising Beattie’s dance ability. Duncan Hayler’s set is an oppressive mass of black and green, a snakeskin feel, with hidden climbing walls. Beauty’s rose bed is a masterpiece. Tim Mitchell’s lighting is exquisite, especially during the moon transformation scene. It all adds up to a visual feast for the eyes.

There are some odd choices however. Not bad, just odd. A delayed entrance for an extended scene change. A set of goblins who are excellent dancers, immediately grotesque, but in such a comic way that it seems to undercut the seriousness of their scenes (while that’s probably the point, they do feel a little out of place, as fun as they are to watch tromping camply about the stage). And while everything else leans towards ‘traditional if elevated’ design wise, when Beauty’s home is repossessed, there is suddenly a modern lorry brought on stage, with sunglassed thugs to man it. The anachronistic feel is a little jarring. Following this, the family end up living in an abandoned tour bus, but the design of that has something of a wooden feel, so doesn’t seem as wrong – it would have been interesting to see the lorry created in a similar fashion.

On a related note, if you are lucky enough to have a seat with a view of the orchestra you will spot that rather than the traditional formal wear, the musicians are wearing t-shirts and waving signs which say ‘Keep Northern Ballet Live’. This is due to funding cuts which from September will mean some Northern Ballet touring productions are accompanied by recorded rather than live music. While the quality of the show would still be high, they would absolutely lose something should this decision go ahead, not to mention the effect on the livelihoods of the musicians themselves. The live orchestra is a character in its own right, and it’s to be hoped that their petition is successful in keeping this extra bit of magic alive. After all, the music is the magic at the heart of Beauty and the Beast, and where would we be without it?

Runs until Sunday 9th June 2024