Ansa Deguchi and Michael Linsmeier in Nacho Duato’s POR VOS MUERO (Photo: Blaine Truitt Covert)
Nacho Duato’s baffling and beautiful Por Vos Muero, little known in the United States, kicked off Oregon Ballet Theatre’s first season under its new artistic director, Kevin Irving. Por Vos Muero (translated, I Would Die for Thee) draws us into a kooky, time-bending world, and Ballet to the People kept asking herself: who ARE these people?
Xuan Cheng, Ansa Deguchi, and Makino Hayashi in Nacho Duato’s POR VOS MUERO (Photo: Blaine Truitt Covert)
Rounding out the evening was former artistic director Christopher Stowell’s Midsummer Night’s Dream, whose fairy kingdom is modeled, enchantingly, on the ancient forests of Oregon’s Opal Creek. One of the joys of this production is the Mendelssohn score played live by OBT’s orchestra, with the voices of the remarkable Pacific Youth Choir.
Makino Hayashi, Xuan Cheng, Michael Linsmeier, and Brett Bauer in Christopher Stowell’s A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM (Photo: Blaine Truitt Covert)
Stowell drafts a tiny, adorable boy to play Cupid – abandoning the conventional device of a magic flower potion. Wafting in and out in the arms of Puck, Zeke Mitchell-Hopmeier slyly zaps the unsuspecting lovers on the head, then gazes out innocently at us as mayhem ensues.
Alison Roper as Titania and Brian Simcoe as Oberon in Christopher Stowell’s A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM (Photo: Blaine Truitt Covert)
Ballet to the People didn’t think any choreographer could improve on Frederick Ashton’s Dream... so what was the verdict in Portland? Find out in her review on BACHTRACK.
