“Swan Lake is the piece that changed my life,” said Matthew Bourne to the gathering of journalists at the Metropolitan Hotel in Tel Aviv in anticipation of tomorrow night’s welcome return of this entertaining and provocative work to the stage of the Israeli Opera House. What had originally been intended as a small, two week project at Sadler’s Wells in London turned into an international hit, as Bourne recalled, “What happened when we first performed this piece was something very extraordinary. We were a small dance company and I had this dream of doing Swan Lake. We were known as quite a quirky company, a company that has quite a lot of humor, known for doing things differently. So when I announced that we were going to do Swan Lake I think most people thought it was going to be funny, a send-up, a parody. When people heard that men were going to be playing the swans, they thought that it was not to be taken seriously.”
“I think that was the feeling generally when people arrived to opening night,” recalled Bourne, “I think they were expecting to enjoy it humorously or were worried about it – that we were going to do something terrible to this wonderful music.”
“The surprise of the production is that there is humor in the piece, it does feel very much at times like you’re watching a musical without lyrics. But the part when the swans come on is the part that shocked people the most, because that was the part they thought was going to be funny. People were expecting to see men dressed as female ballerinas, they were expecting to see men in tutus. People couldn’t imagine what a dancing male swan looked like, but when you do see them, the surprise of it is that when the swans come on it does turn much more serious, and much more mysterious and engaging in a way that draws you in to this animalistic way of interpreting a swan.”
“My reputation has been over the years of being daring, iconoclastic, the bad boy of the ballet. I was called quite often in the early days, things like that,” said Bourne, “That’s not what I was like, I’m not the bad boy of the ballet, I’m not even from the ballet to be honest.”
“I think what I like to do is tell stories and one of the things that appeal to me is these great scores. The great ballets I have re-choreographed and re-thought (Swan Lake, The Nutcracker, Sleeping Beauty) is often inspired by great music. I’m quite reverential toward great music and I’m quite old-fashioned in that I want to give the audience a great night out, I want the audience to get it. I want to take the audience on a journey, I want them to laugh I want them to cry – these are all old-fashioned values and not something you would associate with someone who is supposed to be the bad boy of the ballet.”
When asked about the gay aspect of the production, Bourne responded, “I’ve had my ups and downs with that issue. There is a gay aspect to the production but that’s not what it’s about completely. It can be read in many ways and there are other aspects to this story because it’s not a straightforward gay love story because it’s between a man – a prince, and a creature. It’s not two men, it’s a man and a creature. My concept for the production was about the swan being a symbol for the prince of something that he wanted to be, he wanted to be free, beautiful, wild – all the things that a prince can’t be. So that was something in his nature that he was looking for. It does in the second part turn more into an attraction. when he sees these characteristics in the stranger. I think the height is when the swan wraps the prince up in this wings… It’s about love rather than sex for me… but yes, there is a gay love story in there.”
Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake will be performed at the Israeli Opera from May 3 – 14, 2o14. Tickets may be purchased via the Opera’s website, or call: 03 – 6927777.
