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Agon, Sphinx, Limen Mayerling | Dance review

Source: The Guardian

Nov 08, 2009

Summary

Royal Opera House, London

Ballet makes no ethnic distinctions. We accept without question a Caribbean Romeo or an Asian Juliet. George Balanchine's abstract work Agon, however, has remained subtly colour-conscious since the piece's New York premiere in 1957, when the choreographer caused a frisson by casting the black dancer Arthur Mitchell opposite Diana Adams in the piece's crypto-erotic central duet. Since that date it has become an unspoken tradition to follow suit, and in the revival of the work which opened Wednesday's Royal Ballet triple bill, Cuban guest principal Carlos Acosta danced the pas de deux with the company's blond wonderchild Melissa Hamilton.

It's mesmerising stuff, at once cool and ferociously sexy, with Acosta a study in measured nobility and Hamilton threatening, like the mythical Mélusine, to turn into a snake at any moment. We are equally conscious of difference when, in the pas de trois, Johan Kobborg partners Hikaru Kobayashi and Yuhui Choe – a pitch-perfect meeting of Danish understatement and steel-forged Japanese lyricism. A pity t

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