
17 Mar 1989

Etoile
An American ballerina arrives in Hungary to enroll in a ballet school and it soon becomes apparent that things are not what they seem.
The wicked fairy Carabosse is furious she wasn’t invited to Princess Aurora’s christening. She gives the baby a spindle, saying that one day the Princess will prick her finger on it and die. The Lilac Fairy makes her own christening gift a softening of Carabosse’s curse: Aurora will not die, but will fall into a deep sleep, which only a prince’s kiss will break. The masterful 19th-century choreography of Marius Petipa is combined with sections created for The Royal Ballet by Frederick Ashton, Anthony Dowell and Christopher Wheeldon. Recorded live as part of the Royal Opera House Live Cinema Season 2019/20 with encore screenings broadcast online during the #OurHousetoYourHouse programme.
Princess Aurora
Prince Florimund
Lilac Fairy
Carabosse
King
Queen
Catalabutte
Fairy of The Crystal Fountain / Princess Aurora's Friend / Red Riding Hood
Crystal Fountain Cavalier
Fairy of The Enchanted Garden / Florestan's Sister
Enchanted Garden Cavalier
Fairy of The Woodland Glade
Woodland Glade Cavalier
Fairy of The Song Bird / Florestan's Sister
Song Bird Cavalier / Florestan
Fairy of The Golden Vine
Golden Vine Cavalier
Lilac Fairy's Cavalier / The French Prince / The Wolf
The English Prince
The Indian Prince
17 Mar 1989
An American ballerina arrives in Hungary to enroll in a ballet school and it soon becomes apparent that things are not what they seem.
01 Jan 1968
Swan Lake, a screen adaptation of the ballet of the same name by Pyotr Tchaikovsky. Performed by Kirov Ballet, starring Yelena Yevteyeva as Odette and directed for film by Appolinariy Dudko and Konstantin Sergeyev. Produced by Lenfilm studios in 1968. Orchestra of the S.M. Kirov Leningrad Academic Opera and Ballet Theater, conductor Victor Fedotov. Ballet dancers of the Leningrad State Academic Theater of Opera and Ballet named after S.M. Kirov and students of the Leningrad Choreographic School M. Agrippina Vaganova took part in the film. Golden Orchid Prize - Grand Prix at the VIFF of ballet films in Genoa, Italy (1969).
15 Dec 2022
No overview found
01 Jan 1990
This delightful ballet tells the story of Dr Coppelius, an eccentric toymaker, who attempts to bring life to his beautiful doll Coppélia. He is foiled by the mischevious Swanilda, who masquerades as Coppélia and saves her love, Franz, from the Doctor's magic. Recorded live at the Sydney Opera House, this acclaimed production by Dame Peggy van Praagh, the founding Artistic Director of the Australian Ballet, is a triumph.
01 Oct 2009
At the age of 11, Li was plucked from a poor Chinese village by Madame Mao's cultural delegates and taken to Beijing to study ballet. In 1979, during a cultural exchange to Texas, he falls in love with an American woman. Two years later, he managed to defect and went on to perform as a principal dancer for the Houston Ballet and as a principal artist with the Australian Ballet.
12 May 2000
A group of 12 teenagers from various backgrounds enroll at the American Ballet Academy in New York to make it as ballet dancers and each one deals with the problems and stress of training and getting ahead in the world of dance.
19 Nov 2024
Oscar©, a powerful exploration of the life and writings of literary legend, Oscar Wilde. A spectacular new full-length ballet by Tony Award-winning choreographer Christopher Wheeldon In a celebration of the beauty and complexity of love in all its forms, Oscar© brings queer romance to life through Wheeldon’s innovative and heart-stirring choreography. Oscar© journeys through the extraordinary life of Wilde – a man who dared to live and write with unapologetic boldness – while masterfully integrating two of Wilde’s best-known works, The Nightingale and the Rose and The Picture of Dorian Gray.
15 Oct 2021
Nick and Janine live in bliss until her ex warps time to try to tear them apart by using Nick's old girlfriend. As Nick's memories and reality disappear, he must decide what he's willing to sacrifice to save -- or let go of -- everything he loves.
22 Oct 2019
Matthew Bourne's Romeo and Juliet is a passionate and contemporary re-imagining of Shakespeare's classic love story. Bursting with youth, vitality and Matthew Bourne's trademark storytelling.
16 Dec 1977
The Nutcracker is Mikhail Baryshnikov's breathtaking and critcally acclaimed Emmy nominated production. The thisspectacular performance is danced by the magnificent team of Baryshnikov, one of the greatest classical dancers of the century, and Gelsey Kirkland, both chowcased at the peak of the their careers, with members of the American Ballet Theatre.
05 Nov 2019
From The Royal Ballet’s classical origins in the works of Petipa, to the home-grown choreographers who put British ballet on the world stage, this mixed programme highlights the versatility of the Company. Petipa’s Raymonda Act III is Russian classical ballet summarized in one act, full of sparkle and precise technique, while Ashton’s Enigma Variations is quintessentially British in every way – from its score by Elgar and period designs by Julia Trevelyan Oman, to Ashton’s signature style, the essence of British ballet. Concerto, MacMillan’s fusion of classical technique with a contemporary mind, completes a programme that shows the breadth of the Company’s heritage.
17 Feb 1959
Cursed to die by the evil fairy Maleficent when she was a baby, Princess Aurora is sent into hiding under protection from three good fairies. As she grows up far away, Maleficent becomes increasingly determined to seal the princess's fate.
23 Dec 1983
The Merry Widow, a beguiling, romantic ballet starring Patricia McBride and Peter Martins.
26 Mar 1971
On the occasion of their daughter's birth, the king and queen give a lavish feast. Among the guests are twelve fairies who endow the infant in the cradle with all good qualities. As the king loathes diligence, he does not invite the thirteenth fairy - the fairy of diligence. A captain lets her slip into the castle and she casts a spell on Sleeping Beauty, wishing death upon her. The twelfth fairy transforms and mitigates the spell. On the day she turns fifteen, the princess is to sink into a hundred-year sleep after pricking her finger on a spindle.
21 May 2015
In 1931 Shostakovich wrote a full-length score for the Leningrad Music Hall, for a show that involved many of the leading entertainers of the day, as well as dancing girls, a jazz band, a dancing dog, sequences of silent film, simulated air-raids and gas attacks, a lorry, a storm, waiters and waitresses in a luxury restaurant, river nymphs and even a scene in Heaven with the Devil, the Twelve Apostles, the Archangel Gabriel and all the other angels doing a blasphemous knees-up. The show was naturally a momentary scandal and the score soon disappeared. In 1991 Gerard McBurney reconstructed from the surviving sketches a sequence of 21 of the orchestral numbers to make a hilarious sequence of gallops, saucy polkas, marches and schmoozy waltzes.
13 Nov 2023
Mauro Bigonzetti's ballet based on Franz Kafka, performed by the National Theatre Ballet. Choreographer Mauro Bigonzetti, fascinated by the irresistible language of Prague native Franz Kafka and the enduring relevance of his novel "The Trial," was drawn into the dark world of Josef K and created a modern dance production depicting the world of the protagonist and his hopeless struggle with a cold and heartless modern society. Bigonzatti used music by a number of composers from different historical periods, from D. Buxtehude to H. Górecki, C. Monteverdi, and M. P. Mussorgsky. This selection is remarkably balanced and surprisingly contemporary.
13 May 2014
When a young Prince and his trusted aid learn of a beautiful Princess's cursed eternal slumber, they embark on a journey to rescue her. They must battle an evil queen and legions of undead monsters before she will be free.
02 Feb 2005
Ever since its triumphant premiere in 1960, Frederick Ashton's La Fille mal gardee has been treasured as one of his happiest creations - his artistic tribute to nature, and an expression of his feelings for his beloved Suffolk countryside. Marianela Nunez and Carlos Acosta perfectly portray the young lovers Lise and Colas, determined to thwart the plans of Widow Simone to marry off her wayward daughter to Alain, the simple son of wealthy Farmer Thomas. Osbert Lancaster's colourful, picture-book designs, along with Ferdinand Herold's tuneful score, arranged by John Lanchbery, provide the perfect setting for Ashton's blissfully bucolic ballet, complete with haywain, pony, maypole and ribbons, a cockrel and his chickens and, of course, the famous clog dance, here wonderfully led by William Tuckett as the irascible but lovable Widow Simone.
20 Mar 2012
Matthew Bourne choreographs this performance of Tchaikovsky's ballet, filmed live in London. The show, the longest running ballet on both Broadway and the West End, follows the story of Prince Siegfried, who promises his love to swan maiden Odette, only to be tricked by magician Von Rothbart. The stars include Richard Winsor, Dominic North, Nina Goldman, Madelaine Brennan, Steve Kirkham and Joseph Vaughan.
27 May 1987
Ten short pieces directed by ten different directors, including Ken Russell, Jean-Luc Godard, Robert Altman, Bruce Beresford, and Nicolas Roeg. Each short uses an aria as soundtrack/sound, and is an interpretation of the particular aria.