<img src='' title='Event Category: Event Cinema' alt='' id='templ_icon_' width='' height='' /> Event Category: Event Cinema

The Sleeping Beauty holds a very special place in The Royal Ballet’s heart and history. It was the first performance given by the Company when the Royal Opera House reopened at Covent Garden in 1946 after World War II. In 2006, this original staging was revived and has been delighting audiences ever since. Frederick Ashton famously cited the pure classicism of Marius Petipa’s 19th-century ballet as a private lesson in the atmospheric art and craft of choreography. Be swept away by Tchaikovsky’s ravishing music and Oliver Messel’s sumptuous fairy-tale designs with this true gem from the classical ballet repertory.

BALLET
Choreography – Marius Petipa
Company – The Royal Ballet
Music – Pyotr Il’yich Tchaikovsky

Discover the enchantment of ballet with this sparkling festive treat for the whole family.

Join Clara at a delightful Christmas Eve party that becomes a magical adventure once everyone else is tucked up in bed. Marvel at the brilliance of Tchaikovsky’s score, as Clara and her enchanted Nutcracker fight the Mouse King and visit the Sugar Plum Fairy and her Prince in the glittering Kingdom of Sweets. Peter Wright’s much-loved production for The Royal Ballet, with gorgeous period designs by Julia Trevelyan Oman, keeps true to the spirit of this festive ballet classic, combining the thrill of the fairy tale with spectacular classical dancing.

BALLET
Choreography – Peter Wright after Lev Ivanov
Company – The Royal Ballet
Music – Pyotr Il’yich Tchaikovsky

A modern Mexican classic of magic realism provides the basis for The Royal Ballet’s new full-length work, reuniting Artistic Associate Christopher Wheeldon with the creative team who transformed Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and The Winter’s Tale into dance, composer Joby Talbot and designer Bob Crowley.

The ballet is inspired by Laura Esquivel’s novel – a captivating family saga where the central character’s emotions spill out through cooking to influence everyone around her in startling and dramatic ways. In this co-production with American Ballet Theatre, Mexican conductor Alondra de la Parra also acts as musical consultant for Talbot’s newly commissioned score, and Wheeldon has worked closely with Esquivel to reshape her richly layered story into an entertaining and engrossing new ballet.

BALLET
Choreography – Christopher Wheeldon
Company – The Royal Ballet
Music – Joby Talbot

Royal Ballet Founder Choreographer Frederick Ashton’s Cinderella celebrates its 75th anniversary this Season. The ballet’s opening night in 1948, featuring Moira Shearer and Michael Somes in the lead roles, was received rapturously. After over a decade away from the Royal Opera House stage, Ashton’s timeless reworking of Charles Perrault’s famous rags-to-riches story returns, showcasing the choreographer’s deft musicality and the beauty of Prokofiev’s transcendent score. A creative team steeped in the magic of theatre, film, dance and opera brings new atmosphere to Cinderella’s ethereal world of fairy godmothers and pumpkin carriages, handsome princes and finding true love.

BALLET
Company – The Royal Ballet
Music – Sergey Prokofiev

In the court of Princess Turandot, suitors who fail to solve her riddles are brutally killed. But when a mysterious Prince answers one correctly, suddenly he holds all the power –and a glorious secret. When life hangs in the balance, can love conquer all? Puccini’s score is rich in musical marvels (featuring the famous aria ‘Nessun dorma’), while Andrei Serban’s production draws on Chinese theatrical traditions to evoke a colourful fantasy tableau of ancient Peking. Antonio Pappano conducts Anna Pirozzi in the title role and Yonghoon Lee as Calaf.

OPERA
Company – The Royal Opera
Music – Giacomo Puccini

When Rosina falls in love with a mysterious young suitor who calls himself Lindoro, she must use all her cunning –and a little help from her local barber –to outwit her calculating guardian Dr Bartolo. Expect heart-melting serenades, ridiculous disguises and a fairytale ending waiting just out of reach. From the barber’s famous opening number ‘Largo al factotum,’ with its cry of ‘Figaro!Figaro!,’ to Rosina’s feisty aria ‘Una voce poco fa,’ Gioachino Rossini’s comic opera is a riotously entertaining affair. Rafael Payare makes his Royal Opera House debut conducting an outstanding internationalcast that includes Andrzej Filończyk, Aigul Akhmetshina, Lawrence Brownlee and Bryn Terfel.

OPERA
Company – The Royal Opera
Music – Gioachino Rossini

Approximately 3 hours 45 minutes (including two intervals)

A dazzling showcase marking 60 years of the Friends of the Royal Opera House.

The Royal Ballet’s dazzling Principals lead an evening not to be missed, their sparkling talents a perfect fit for a diamond anniversary. Celebrating the 60^th anniversary of The Friends of Covent Garden, this programme recognises the amazing support of all ROH Friends past and present.

The showcase will demonstrate the breadth and diversity of The Royal Ballet’s repertory in classical, contemporary and heritage works. It will also include world premieres of short ballets by choreographers Pam Tanowitz, Joseph Toonga and Valentino Zucchetti as well as The Royal Ballet’s first performance of For Four by Artistic Associate Christopher Wheeldon and a performance of George Balanchine’s Diamonds.

BALLET
Company – The Royal Ballet

Puccini’s opera of passion, friendship and heartbreak features a star-studded cast, conducted by Kevin John Edusei.

Paris, 1900. Penniless writer Rodolfo believes that art is all he needs – until he meets Mimì, the lonely seamstress who lives upstairs. So begins a timeless love story that blooms, fades, and rekindles with the passing seasons. But while the couple’s friends Marcello and Musetta passionately row and make up, a force greater than love threatens Rodolfo and Mimì.

Richard Jones’s production evokes the vivid contrasts of fin de siècle Paris, from Bohemian apartments to glittering arcades.

OPERA
Company – The Royal Opera
Music – Giacomo Puccini

A rollicking new comedy by Richard Bean (One Man, Two Guvnors) and Oliver Chris (Twelfth Night).

After an aerial dog fight, Pilot Officer Jack Absolute flies home to win the heart of his old flame, Lydia Languish. Back on British soil, Jack’s advances soon turn to anarchy when the young heiress demands to be loved on her own, very particular, terms.

Emily Burns directs this spectacularly entertaining new version of Sheridan’s The Rivals. Featuring a cast including Caroline Quentin, Laurie Davidson, Natalie Simpson and Kelvin Fletcher.

‘One of the funniest productions in the National’s history.’ Guardian on One Man, Two Guvnors.

Jack Absolute Flies Again
by Richard Bean and Oliver Chris
based on Richard Brinsley Sheridan’s The Rivals

*Please note, this screening starts promptly at 7pm

Love and duty collide and nations clash in Verdi’s political drama, starring Elena Stikhina and conducted by Antonio Pappano.

Princess Aida has been kidnapped: a valuable prize in a war between Egypt and Ethiopia. Meanwhile, the ambitious soldier Radames wrestles with his feelings for her. As they draw closer together, each must make an agonizing choice between their loyalty to home, and their love for each other.

In this new production, director Robert Carsen situates Verdi’s large-scale political drama within a contemporary world, framing its power struggles and toxic jealousies in the apparatus of a modern, totalitarian state. Royal Opera Music Director Antonio Pappano conducts Verdi’s glorious, monumental score.

OPERA
Company – The Royal Opera
Music – Giuseppe Verdi

Approximately 2 hours 50 minutes (including one interval)