Among the banquet of ballets selected by David McAllister for the Australian Ballet’s 50th anniversary feast is the three-act Onegin, based on the verse novel by Alexander Pushkin. The ballet has been on McAllister’s wish list for quite a while. He believes Onegin to be “one of the great ballets of the 20th century, if not the ballet of the 20th century”.
Choreographed in 1965 by the late, great John Cranko, former artistic director of the Stuttgart Ballet in Germany, it was brought into the AB’s repertoire by Ann Woolliams, who was artistic director of the AB from 1976-7. Its inclusion in the anniversary program is McAllister’s tribute to her part in the company’s history.
Yet, despite its popularity with Australian audiences and dancers, Onegin has not been performed since 1996. The main reason, according to McAllister, is the set, “which is very difficult to reproduce and very expensive”. The set the company built in 1996 was deemed as not close enough to the original. The company has overcome the difficulties with newly refurbished costumes for this season, and a set hired from the Royal Danish and Swedish Ballet companies, which stage a joint production every couple of years. Next time the AB performs the ballet it will create its own new sets.
What are the difficulties in creating the set?
“It is made out of materials which are very delicate,” McAllister explains. “Even in Stuttgart they have a rolling refurbishment program. The set breaks down very quickly and easily. It has to be very transluscent and lit in certain ways - when you light it one way it looks solid and when you light it another way it looks transluscent, and you need quite particular types of materials to achieve that effect. It’s quite an undertaking.”
Cast in the lead role of Eugene Onegin are Adam Bull, Rudy Hawkes and Kevin Jackson. Dancing the covetted principal role of Tatiana are Rachel Rawlins; Amber Scott, Madeleine Eastoe and Miwako Kubota.
- KAREN VAN ULZEN
'Onegin' runs at the Sydney Opera House till May 21 before moving to the State Theatre, Melbourne, from June 32 to July 4.
See our interview with Amber Scott on dancing the role of Tatiana in the June/July issue of ‘Dance Australia’.