SUBSCRIBE | TRY A MONTH FREE Subscribe
Close
  • Coffee House
    • UK POLITICS
    • EU
    • BREXIT
    • US POLITICS
    • RELIGION
    • STEERPIKE
    • CULTURE
    • COFFEE HOUSE SHOTS PODCAST
  • Magazine
    • FEATURES
    • COLUMNISTS
    • BOOKS
    • ARTS
    • LIFE
    • CARTOONS
  • Radio
    • THE SPECTATOR PODCAST
    • COFFEE HOUSE SHOTS
    • AMERICANO
    • WOMEN WITH BALLS
    • BOOKS PODCAST
    • THE GREEN ROOM
    • TABLE TALK
    • HOLY SMOKE
  • Writers
    • ROD LIDDLE
    • NICK COHEN
    • DOUGLAS MURRAY
    • FRASER NELSON
    • JAMES FORSYTH
    • ISABEL HARDMAN
    • LIONEL SHRIVER
  • Books & Arts
    • ARTS
    • BOOKS
    • BOOKS PODCAST
    • CULTURE HOUSE DAILY
  • Life
  • EVENTS
  • More
    • SHOP
    • CARTOONS
    • 2020 DIARY
    • GIFTS
    • EMAIL BULLETINS
    • WINE CLUB
    • SPECTATOR CLUB
SUBSCRIBE | TRY A MONTH FREE

Ismene Brown

This Juliet needs a new Romeo

Ismene Brown 29 October 2015 9:00 am

You always remember your first time, don’t you? And in ballet one imagines that Juliet wants to remember her first…

Giselle has floored many a ballerina — it did so again last week

Ismene Brown 17 October 2015 8:00 am

English has all sorts of emotive metaphors for how we feel about the ground. We’re floored. Or well grounded. Or…

The best ballerinas in Britain at the moment are hairy and male

Ismene Brown 3 October 2015 9:00 am

There was blood on the walls and floor at the birth of Kenneth MacMillan’s Romeo and Juliet in 1965. The…

War, socialist tyranny and the oppression of the handicapped - welcome to the new dance season

Ismene Brown 19 September 2015 8:00 am

If there’s one thing scarcer than hen’s teeth in serious choreography nowadays, it’s a light heart. When was the last…

Dance from Edinburgh: a flamenco master who could tell classical ballet a thing or two

Ismene Brown 29 August 2015 9:00 am

Every August when London dims, Edinburgh calls, promising nothing less than ‘the greats of the arts’ at the International Festival.…

Sylvie Guillem’s better than ever in her final, final Coliseum farewell

Ismene Brown 15 August 2015 9:00 am

The blackness that sweeps along the stage behind Sylvie Guillem’s disappearing figure in the Russell Maliphant piece on her farewell…

You can feel as if you’re in a colony of rabbits: Matthew Bourne’s Car Man reviewed

Ismene Brown 1 August 2015 9:00 am

Hot, languorous, sizzling… I was thinking what an ideal show Matthew Bourne’s noir comedy is to watch on a summer’s…

Ninja Turtles have no place in Cinderella

Ismene Brown 18 July 2015 9:00 am

What could induce a grown-up, rational, childless person to go to see the ballet of Cinderella? You’ll expect to cringe…

The Sun King deserves better than this silly cabaret from Birmingham Royal Ballet

Ismene Brown 4 July 2015 9:00 am

It’s a comfort that the creation of a new ballet inspired by French court entertainment can still happen in the…

The choreographer that does things to tango couples that Relate would not recommend

Ismene Brown 20 June 2015 9:00 am

I often regret that I’m writing in the past tense here, but never more than about milonga. It is such…

Sylvie Guillem, in savage-child tunic and a Mowgli wig, says farewell to her fans

Is that Sylvie Guillem? Or R2-D2? Guillem's farewell dance at Sadler’s Wells reviewed

Ismene Brown 6 June 2015 9:00 am

There’s been a clutch of middle-aged danseuses taking leave of life in one way or another recently. We’ve seen the…

Rapture - and loathing: Woolf Works at the Royal Ballet reviewed

Ismene Brown 23 May 2015 9:00 am

People have been saying that Wayne McGregor’s new Woolf Works has reinvented the three-act ballet, but not so. William Forsythe…

Rosie Kay’s 5 Soldiers: brutishly physical and powerfully striking

Ismene Brown 9 May 2015 9:00 am

In dance, it’s usually the moment the boys start fighting that challenges your suspension of disbelief. Synchronised fencing (MacMillan’s Romeo…

Vadim Muntagirov and Laura Morera in ‘La Fille mal gardée’

La Fille mal gardee at the Royal Opera House reviewed: light, lithe and tender

Ismene Brown 25 April 2015 9:00 am

The current talking-point at the Royal Ballet is the Russians milling around. One can sound unfortunately as if one’s starting…

An Indian Bayadère that meets a sludgy end

Ismene Brown 11 April 2015 9:00 am

For an Indian woman to make a dancework about La Bayadère is a promising prospect. This classical ballet of 1877…

Birmingham Royal Ballet review: A Father Ted Carmina Burana

Ismene Brown 4 April 2015 9:00 am

We ballet-goers may be the most self-deceiving audiences in theatre. Put a ‘new work’ in front of us and half…

Leonid Yakobson in Leningrad c. 1926

Leonid Yakobson: the greatest ballet genius you’ve never heard of

Ismene Brown 28 March 2015 9:00 am

On YouTube there’s a brief dance video of a Viennese waltz so enchanting that not even Fred and Ginger in…

50 shades of beige: English National Ballet's Modern Masters at Sadler's Wells, reviewed

Ismene Brown 21 March 2015 9:00 am

My moment of the week was stumbling into the shocking, fantastical Cabinet of Curiosities in the Alexander McQueen show at…

A legendary piece of iconoclastic dance returns. Does the piece still stand up?

Ismene Brown 28 February 2015 9:00 am

Funny how things turn upside-down with time. A work of contemporary dance that made an iconoclastic splash decades ago is…

Wings of desire: film still of Natalia Makarova and Anthony Dowell in ‘Swan Lake’, 1980

Will the real Swan Lake please stand up

Ismene Brown 21 February 2015 9:00 am

Ismene Brown unpicks the great enigma of ballet theatre

The Associates at Sadler's Wells reviewed: another acutely inventive work from Crystal Pite

Ismene Brown 14 February 2015 9:00 am

The prodigious streetdancer Tommy Franzén pops up everywhere from family-friendly hip-hop shows by ZooNation, Boy Blue and Bounce to serious…

London International Mime Festival review: on juggling, dance and Wayne Rooney's hair transplant

Ismene Brown 31 January 2015 9:00 am

January is something of a palate-cleanser for the year, as the London International Mime Festival flies in plane-loads of companies…

ENB’s Swan Lake: the rights and wrongs of ballet thighs

Ismene Brown 17 January 2015 9:00 am

There’s been heated disagreement over the past week about what’s right and wrong. Is the rocket-propelled ex-Bolshoi enfant terrible Ivan…

Better than Leslie Caron: Leanne Cope (Lise) and the company in ‘An American in Paris’

An American in Paris: a zingy new Wheeldon dance-musical that you won’t want to miss

Ismene Brown 3 January 2015 9:00 am

A new year must start with hope and resolution, and if you’re very rich, with influence in the highest places,…

Sensual but not thrilling: Carlos Acosta as Basilio

Royal Ballet’s Don Quixote: Carlos Acosta is too brainy with this no-brain ballet

Ismene Brown 13 December 2014 9:00 am

One feels the pang of impending failure whenever the Royal Ballet ventures like a deluded Don Quixote into a periodic…

« 1 2 3 »

Follow us

Follow us on Twitter @spectator Like us on Facebook Follow us on Instagram @spectatorlife
Click here to find out more about subscribing to The Spectator’s free podcasts

Most Popular

  • Read
  • Recent
  • Read
    1. We don’t owe Waspi women tea and biscuits

      Lionel Shriver

    2. Nightmare on Downing Street: what could happen on Friday 13th?

      Liam Halligan

    3. Why I feel sorry for Jo Swinson’s Lib Dems

      Robert Peston

    4. We are witnessing the death throes of Corbynism

      Steven Fielding

    5. Jo Swinson’s Andrew Neil interview exposed her party’s Brexit extremism

      Stephen Daisley

    6. The Tories will win - but with no thanks to the North

      Matthew Parris

    7. Why people with learning disabilities should be allowed to work for less than the minimum wage

      Rosa Monckton

    8. Watch: Andrew Neil eviscerates Boris Johnson over interview no show

      Steerpike

    9. Fear has triumphed over loathing this general election

      Nick Cohen

    10. The anti-Grieve Beaconsfield Brexit Blimp

      Steerpike

  • Recent
    1. Live blog: Boris vs Corbyn’s BBC clash

      The Spectator

    2. Corbynomics won’t help the poor

      James Kirkup

    3. The Edition podcast: what would the Corbyn nightmare look like?

      Cindy Yu

    4. Has Boris Johnson changed his campaign strategy?

      Gus Carter

    5. Channel 4 apologises for Boris ‘people of colour’ video

      Steerpike

    6. The margin between a Tory landslide and defeat is tiny

      James Kanagasooriam

    7. Watch: Andrew Neil eviscerates Boris Johnson over interview no show

      Steerpike

    8. The anti-Grieve Beaconsfield Brexit Blimp

      Steerpike

    9. Boris Johnson’s Huawei selfie-own

      Steerpike

    10. Fear has triumphed over loathing this general election

      Nick Cohen

Editor’s Choice

We could certainly do with a Tacitus now

Six weeks is too long for an election campaign

Will Self’s memoir of drug addiction is a masterpiece of black humour

I’ve never seen a film like it: Ordinary Love reviewed

Cartoons

‘So much for the parties’ tree-planting pledge.’
‘There’s 3.5 times surge pricing.’
‘Daddy, what did you tweet in the culture war?’
‘Alexa, do you remember the good old days?’

Follow us on Twitter @spectator Like us on Facebook Follow us on Instagram @spectatorlife
  • About
    • Contact Us
    • FAQs
    • Privacy Policy
    • Terms and Conditions
    • Jobs and Vacancies
  • More from The Spectator
    • Spectator USA
    • The Spectator Australia
    • Apollo Magazine
    • The Spectator Shop
  • Advertising
    • Classified Advertisements
    • Advertising Terms and Conditions
  • Subscribe
    • Club
The Spectator, 22 Old Queen Street, London, SW1H 9HP
+44 (0)3303 330 050+44 (0)3303 333 9403
Site maintained by Creode
Close
  • Coffee House
    • UK POLITICS
    • EU
    • BREXIT
    • US POLITICS
    • RELIGION
    • STEERPIKE
    • CULTURE
    • COFFEE HOUSE SHOTS PODCAST
  • Magazine
    • FEATURES
    • COLUMNISTS
    • BOOKS
    • ARTS
    • LIFE
    • CARTOONS
  • Radio
    • THE SPECTATOR PODCAST
    • COFFEE HOUSE SHOTS
    • AMERICANO
    • WOMEN WITH BALLS
    • BOOKS PODCAST
    • THE GREEN ROOM
    • TABLE TALK
    • HOLY SMOKE
  • Writers
    • ROD LIDDLE
    • NICK COHEN
    • DOUGLAS MURRAY
    • FRASER NELSON
    • JAMES FORSYTH
    • ISABEL HARDMAN
    • LIONEL SHRIVER
  • Books & Arts
    • ARTS
    • BOOKS
    • BOOKS PODCAST
    • CULTURE HOUSE DAILY
  • Life
  • EVENTS
  • More
    • SHOP
    • CARTOONS
    • 2020 DIARY
    • GIFTS
    • EMAIL BULLETINS
    • WINE CLUB
    • SPECTATOR CLUB