The choreographic partnership of Sol Leon and Paul Lightfoot has long been celebrated in mainland Europe: a new double bill presented by the Royal Ballet is the first time their work has been showcased for British audiences. The first-night reception to Covent Garden was rapturous, but I wonder how long the excitement will last.
What an astounding masterpiece this ballet is. I adore it, who couldn’t?
Leon and Lightfoot specialise in movement characterised by a nervous staccato, suggestive both of psychic anxiety and robotic precision: the dancers look demented or brain-dead, animatronically controlled. Black is the dominant colour (Leon and Lightfoot are often their own designers) and the lighting does more to shade than illuminate. It is all very chic indeed.
Shoot the Moon, performed to a piano concerto by Philip Glass, has undoubted visceral power. Three empty rooms are seen in rotation. Two couples are in crisis, shrieking and vomiting and generally tearing into each other: one pair is locked into a folie à deux that looks like it will end in suicide; in another room, a woman seeks escape through an affair in a third room with a lonely man, leaving her partner in despair. This basic scenario provides a tight frame for the depiction of relentless angst, and for some superb performances – particularly those of Matthew Ball and Lauren Cuthbertson, charged with furious intensity.
