THE SNOW QUEEN

English National Ballet at the Coliseum

13.01.10

A succession of wintry landscapes, crowds of Eastern Europeans looking by turns stoical and ecstatic, few seats to be had. And that's just the train journey up to town …

This was the 50th performance of Michael Corder's sumptuous take on the Andersen fairytale, with Prokofiev's music brilliantly adapted to fit by Julian Philips.

Considering that this is essentially a touring show, it looked wonderful, at least in the realms of winter. Snow, shards of ice, mirrors, the Snow Queen's throne somewhere between Narnia and Titania's bower. A large company provided some pleasing set pieces, especially in the third act.

Some impressive solo work, too, notably from the diminutive Crystal Costa, who made much of the peasant girl Gerda, who rescues Kay [Yat-Sen Chang] from the Queen's evil clutches; a highlight of this revival was her dream-ballet in Act Two, in which she is swept away in the arms of two Nijinskys, white and red Rose Spectres. The title role was danced by Sarah McIlroy, a glamorous, seductive villain. Dmitri Gruzdyev, the dance double for Nureyev in the BBC's recent Margot, was a fluent, athletic Gipsy Boy.

For all its Russian feel, there was little truly spectacular choreography, and, for a family show, rather too much graceful but gratuitous dancing. Nonetheless, a fitting old-fashioned treat for this Siberian winter, when even the Coliseum audience had snow on their boots …