On January 20th, the all-male ballet troupe, Les Ballets Trocadero de Monte Carlo, stunned the eager spectators packed inside the Queen Elizabeth Theatre in Vancouver, and I was proud to be one of them.
The Trockadero dancers take crazy stage names; a few of my favourites include Ida Nevasayneva, Innokenti Smoktumuchsky, and Tatiana Youbetchabootskaya, to name a few. The show began with a few announcements, which were rife with similar puns, and I knew my sense of humour would be right at home in this audience.
First came a gut-busting interpretation of Swan Lake – that iconic love story of Prince Siegfried and the enchanted swan maiden Odette, before moving on to excepts from La Esmeralda and Don Quixote. Every piece was swimming in hilarity and perfectly executed with incredible skill. Even mistakes were choreographed into the scenes, such as one over-enthusiastic swan “kicking” another in the jaw and neglecting to apologize. In another instance, one ballerina munched on a banana while the main couple danced in centre stage. Such departures from the jaw-dropping precision the dancers maintained at all other times kept the audience in stitches from laughter throughout the evening.
Swan Lake maintained a marked focus on the comedic elements of the performance with plenty of over-the-top physical comedy, including one dance where an especially small courtesan repeatedly drops an especially tall swan, earning several furious glares. La Esmeralda served as a lovely transition piece and made extensive use of odd and hilariously unexpected sound-making props for the music. Don Quixote, in contrast to Swan Lake, drew the audience in with a dizzying display of exquisite technical prowess instead of focusing on the comedy.
And what prowess! What athleticism! If in my entire lifetime I could manage to be half as strong, graceful, flexible and coordinated as these dancers, then it will be more than I ever dreamed. Their poise and control was absolutely perfect, and were I a stereotypical teenaged girl, my sole reaction would be something along the lines of “I can’t even.”
The performance left me grinning with glee and with hands that burned and stung from applauding. For anyone who enjoys a good laugh along with flawless showmanship and stunning athletic skill, I can fully recommend seeing Les Ballets Trocadero de Monte Carlo the next time you have the chance.
Photo Credits: Avery Creed, Marcello Orselli, Zoran Jelenic