Mary, Queen of Scots: 'fizzing' ballet is a hit

Scottish Ballet has "scored a hit" with its new "Mary, Queen of Scots", which premiered this week at the Edinburgh International Festival, said Donald Hutera in The Times. Choreographer Sophie Laplane and director James Bonas have created an "audaciously bold, assured and sometimes downright wacky" take on Scotland's doomed monarch – filtering Mary's story through the imagined memories of her cousin, rival and nemesis, Queen Elizabeth I.

The storytelling is "episodic yet fleet", and the production is stylish and handsome – with both a "quirky sense of humour" and "emotional gravitas". A warning: the dense first act might challenge anyone who's not clear on the history. But the pay-off comes in the second act, as this "fizzing" ballet expands and deepens into "that rare thing: a work I felt I would gladly revisit even as I was watching it".

Imagine if, just before bedtime, you were to "read a 'Horrible Histories' on the Tudors, leaf through a Vivienne Westwood catalogue and then wolf down an indecently large slab of roquefort". The resulting dream, said Mark Monahan in The Daily Telegraph, might capture the spirit of this eccentric but "richly theatrical" and impressive new work. The first act is too long, but "there's a great deal to enjoy here for dance tyros and devotees alike" – notably the two queens' "nightmarish pas de deux", performed on a podium, while blood cascades down the set's "perfect white walls".

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Laplane's choreography shows an eclectic range of influences, said Lucy Ribchester in The Scotsman. There's "graceful courtly posturing, flat-footed earthy cèilidhs and even glimpses of tango in a sultry duet" between Mary and Darnley, her husband. Similarly, the score (by Mikael Karlsson and Michael P. Atkinson) draws variously on electro-acoustic, Scottish melodies, Elizabethan jigs and "pure musical drama". All the dancers impress, but Charlotta Öfverholm, as the older Elizabeth, most of all. She brings a "wisdom and vulnerability to her movement that is endlessly compelling to watch".

Scottish Ballet, touring Scotland 17 September to 18 October, scottishballet.co.uk