My first experience of Giselle was back in Manchester in 1994 with Derek Deane's production set in post WW1 Austria, Jane Haworth dancing the role of Myrtha, but today dancing Giselle's mother Berthe.
The current production pre-dates that - it's by Mary Skeaping, first performed in 1971 by the ENB, in those days known as the London Festival Ballet. This production is close to a reconstruction of the original Giselle performed and demonstrates just how much has changed over past century or so. For a start, the music of Adolphe Adam has since dropped a fugue in Act 2, which even to the untrained ear sounds rather out of place.
In Act 1, a lot of the story is told in mime - Loys (Prince Albrecht in disguise) and Giselle falling in love, Hillarion warning Giselle away from him, Berthe; Giselle's mother miming the fate of young girls with weak hearts like Giselle's who will surely die and join the man-hating Willis, spirits who suffered untimely deaths before they were wed. Comparing with Peter Wright's production for the Royal Ballet, there is significantly more mime and therefore less dancing. There is also no pas de six, but a pas de deux danced by the brilliant Cesar Corrales (winner of ENB's Emerging Dancer competition in 2016) and Rina Kanehara (Emerging Dancer finalist 2016) which was reputed to have been added in the 1840s for dancer Nathalie Fitz-James who used her influence as the mistress of a patron of the Paris Opera.
The close of Act 1 is incredibly emotive - Giselle driven to death possibly by her weak heart, or possibly with the grasping of Albrecht's sword which is rather quickly removed from her hands. The act ends with Berthe and Albrecht beside themselves next to Giselle's body, Berthe pushing Albrecht away and the two love rivals arguing as to who was to cause for her death.
Act 2 was a sheer celebration of dance. Although known as a 'white ballet', the costume designers have given ghostly Willis have a hit of green in their costumes and mist is created by a little stage smoke, giving this act the sense of a spooky forest graveyard. Michaela de Prince from the Dutch National Ballet guested as a physically powerful and unforgiving Myrtha, while still delicate in her arms and light on her feet.
And so to the star of the show - Alina Cojocaru for whom this week was her debut as Giselle for the ENB and what a Giselle she was! Young, playful and in love in act 1, while still obviously with a delicate heart. A highly spirited performance and she acted youth well. In act 2, she becomes the epitome of the romantic era of ballet. It is through her portrayal of Giselle here that you can imagine how powerful the introduction of pointe shoes were in the 19th Century, for she truly appeared to glide across the stage like a ghostly apparition.
And so I start to wonder again about the story of Giselle and how this village girl is duped into loving a man who is already taken, so forgiving in death, wanting to protect him from Myrtha. Do we assume that Albrecht's intentions were somewhat honest, that he was betrothed to a woman he had no feelings for,a highly likely situation in those days?
Giselle runs to 22 January at the London Coliseum.
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