Queensland Ballet presents Kenneth MacMillan's Romeo & Juliet - Review

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Fri 21 Mar 2025 - Sat 29 Mar 2025

Jaw-dropping, show-stopping brilliance

Take the best of the past - a well-known Shakespearian tragedy, Romeo and Juliet. Combine it with world-class choreography in the form of MacMillan’s elite ballet named the same. And coalesce this with the show-stopping brilliance of an Antipodean Ballet company performing at its prime. The result? A jaw-dropping opening-night performance which propelled the whole audience onto its feet in a thunderous standing ovation. And on that night I thought this was a good place to be - in modern Brisbane where the performing arts can reach their zenith and at this point and this part of the world where a discerning and friendly crowd could enjoy the display of vigorous sword-fighting but very unlikely to ever participate in it!

I would like to say that this large and ambitious performance was so good it left me speechless and leave it there. But for a review, I must somehow try to explain the sometimes inexplicable and try to do the performance justice.



Of course, the art form, ballet, gets the prime accolade in this review as it was brilliantly danced by both the soloists and the ballet corps but more of that later. What was stunning about this performance was how many elements threatened to upstage the dancers!

Starting with the costumes, their allure had many elements. They started their life in a German warehouse and were purchased in 2019 by Queensland Ballet to meet the rigorous costume and set design requirements for a MacMillan production. Against all odds (including two years of delays due to the COVID-19 pandemic) our small ballet company ended up with an international coup. Only two designs are approved for use for MacMillan’s Romeo and Juliet and there are only a handful of these costume suites worldwide. This treasure trove of 720 costume pieces finally got its airing for this 2025 production and they are so beautiful and so realistic that you could be forgiven for thinking they had mistakenly fallen off the back of a truck rapidly leaving the British Museum! Fortunately, we know they were legitimately purchased due to the good offices of Li Cunxin and the generosity of donors which means that these sumptuous costumes are now all ours to enjoy. To say they augmented the production is an understatement. They lifted it to world class.




At the risk of literary repetition, the staging also threatened to upstage the dancers. The sets haled from the same German warehouse and, with some upgrades and safety features, they provided a rich backdrop to the drama below. They served to emphasise the heightened status of the Capulets (as did the costumes which had richer textiles and design for the Capulets over the Montagues). They also served to free space on the stage for the vigorous dancing and sword-fighting below and provided the platform for the famous Juliet balcony scene



But Queensland Ballet did not merely rely on superb sets for immaculate staging. When the curtain rose and each scene commenced (and there were 13 of them) we were treated to stunning tableaux. These were as carefully crafted as scenes painted by historical masters to create an initial visual impression. As action commenced the elements of the mis en scene showed staging at its finest. Characters were arranged on stage for both visual impact and the choreography, lighting picked up the rich brocades, and the towering sets created either a colourful or brooding background depending on the scene. The lighting was masterful - every part of the stage could be seen and facial expressions as well as softly highlighting action during dark scenes.

The live music by the Queensland Symphony Orchestra under the baton of Nigel Gaynor is always dynamic. But the dramatic music of Prokoviev for this production had an even greater edge-of-your-seat impact that kept the audience engaged in the seething drama and punctuated its tumultuous musical phrases with moments of pin-drop silence.




And so to the dancing itself. If you come to see a love story with some steamy romantic scenes you will not be disappointed. On opening night Patricio Reve and Chiara Gonzalez enacted and danced the roles of star-crossed lovers with sensitivity and realism. The pas de deux (and there were many of these) were exquisite. Chiara’s ability to appear childlike initially and morph into a passionate young woman was superb. Her end scene which required her to appear lifeless yet required muscular strength so she could be lifted and carried without harm was outstanding. And even though there is no surprise how Juliet ends her life with a dagger, Chiara acted this so well that there was a collective gasp from the audience when it happens. Patricio’s dance has matured in his role as principal artist and to my eyes he is a master of form and expression. He was a joy to watch.



If you come to see fiery Shakespearian fighting scenes in this ballet you also will not be disappointed. Male dancers (Kohei Iwamoto, Joshua Ostermann, Vito Bernascoi, Edison Manuel) took centre stage in this ballet with plenty of scope to showcase their athleticism in sword-fighting and expressive dance in jealous feuds, goading, mocking, larrikinism, and, of course, vying for the attention of both damsels and harlots (the latter hilariously portrayed and danced by Georgia Swan, Laura Tosar and Vanessa Morelli). Bravura dance steps were given to Romeo (Reve) Mercutio (Iwamoto) Benvolio (Ostermann) to signal that these were the heroic figures of the ballet rather than being given grand entrances as with traditional ballet. There was no shortage of testosterone in this ballet which is hardly surprising given it is based on a Shakespearian play written for only male actors. But McMillan’s choreography counterbalances this with a vast array of male and female characters including Verona villagers, stately aristocrats, beggars and servants.



With a cast of over seventy dancers who are on stage for over two hours, this would have been a monumental task of coordinating the cast into a cohesive whole. Mathew Lawrence, ballet master said “It’s one of those ballets that, the more the person up the back is committed to it, the fuller the picture. You go from the back forward because if you get those people looking real, looking tight then it becomes three dimensional”. These background verismo crowd scenes were done the best I have ever seen with Queensland Ballet. Also, naturalistic character dancing from all the dancers on stage is the best I have seen. I applaud all those who brought this next level dancing into fruition. It created a cohesive and engaging ballet throughout.

As I watched the new artistic director, Ivan Gil Ortega, at the after-event bring all the dancers and creatives on stage for his speech, I was struck with the impression that part of that fairy dust is coming from the helm. The best direction is one that affirms and coheres as a whole to all those who are pouring their energy, heart and soul into a production. And I think the results show and bode well for the 2025 season.

*Images David Kelly

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