The Royal Ballet: Within the Golden Hour / Medusa / Flight Pattern (2019)

Bolshoi Ballet: The Golden Age

In the 1920’s, The Golden Age cabaret is a favorite nightly haunt. The young fisherman Boris falls in love with Rita. He follows her to the cabaret and realizes that she is the beautiful dancer “Mademoiselle Margot,” but also the love interest of the local gangster Yashka. With its jazzy score by Dmitri Shostakovich and its music-hall atmosphere featuring beautiful tangos, The Golden Age is a refreshing and colorful dive into the roaring 20’s. A historic ballet that can be seen only at the Bolshoi! Captured live on Oct 16, 2016.

Nijinsky

A ballet dancer struggles with his homosexuality and the increasing allure of a young ballerina who seeks to draw him away from his domineering lover.

Carlos Acosta: Spartacus

Internationally acclaimed as the greatest male dancer of his generation, Carlos Acosta stars as the rebel slave in the most spectacular of Soviet ballets. Filmed in Paris after triumphant performances in Moscow and London, the Bolshoi's classic production presents the Cuban star at the height of his physical and dramatic powers -- as the greatest Spartacus of our time.

Seven Beauties

Based on the music of the famous Azerbaijani composer Kara Karayev. The ballet libretto is based on the poem “Seven Beauties” (Khamsa) by Nizami Ganjavi, created in 1197.

Billy Rose's Casa Mañana Revue

The scene is set at Billy Rose's Casa Manana Revue, filmed at the Fort Worth Frontier Fiesta (1937), an enormous production created as part of the Texas Centennial civic celebrations. The opening song, "The Night Is Young And You're So Beautiful" emanated from the first edition of the Revue and became a hit song on two continents in 1936.

A Dancer's World

A glimpse into the world and methodology of dancer Martha Graham.

La Scala Ballet: La Bayadère

The 2006 revival of Natalia Makarova's 1992 production of La Bayadere, recorded at the Teatro alla Scala featuring two international ballet stars Svetlana Zakharova and Roberto Bolle.

Snow White: The Sacrifice

This ballet production tells a dark version of the story of Snow White, as a vain and desperate aging queen attempts to have her beautiful daughter murdered.

Out Where the Stars Begin

When the ballerina star of a musical feature walks off in a huff, aided by the fit-throwing director, her understudy steps in and a star is born.

Swan Lake

Perhaps the most popular ballet video ever released, this version of Tchaikovsky's beloved work stars one of the most famous classical dance partnerships of all time, Rudolf Nureyev and Margot Fonteyn. Nureyev choreographed this production for the Vienna State Opera Ballet. Two icons of 20th-century dance in magnificent form. Ballet authority John Lanchbery, former music director of the Sadler's Wells and Royal Ballet companies, as well as of American Ballet Theatre and Australian Ballet, conducts the Vienna Symphony Orchestra in Tchaikovsky's enchanting score.

Anna Karenina

The film is a Bolshoi Ballet version of Leo Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina with choreography by Maya Plisetskaya who also took on the titular role. Anna Karenina is a young wife of an older husband. She has an affair with the handsome Count Vronsky. By following her desires Anna complicates her life.

Bolshoi Ballet: Raymonda

At the castle of Countess Sybil de Daurice, Raymonda is celebrating her birthday. She is also about to bid farewell to her fiancé, knight Jean de Brienne, who is going on a crusade. At night Raymonda falls asleep and dreams that she is taken to a magical garden where she is reunited with her fiancé. Suddenly, Jean de Brienne disappears and an Arab sheik takes his place and declares his passion for her. When she wakes, Raymonda discovers with horror that her nightmare has become reality… Live performance 24 Jun 2012

Raymonda

Recorded live from the Teatro all Scala, Milan, 2011

The Flames of Paris

A tale of the French Revolution, The Flames of Paris belongs to the pearls of the pure classics of classical dance. This world premiere recording of the production from choreographer Alexei Ratmansky (after Vasily Vaynonenon) and the Bolshoi Ballet, features the standout soloists Natalia Osipova and Ivan Vasiliev. Although set in revolutionary France, The Flames of Paris was intended to serve as an allegory for contemporary events in the Soviet Union. The ballet premiered in 1932 on the anniversary of the October Revolution, and one of its main characters was the population - revolutionary in mood and ready for action. Not surprisingly, The Flames of Paris was quickly included in the ranks of works which were always presented for major anniversaries.The choreographer Alexei Ratmansky has attempted to make maximum use of the preserved fragments of Vasily Vainonen in his new ballet.

Bolshoi Ballet: Coppélia

In this joyful version, a beautiful mechanical doll interferes with the happiness of two lovers. Original choreography by Marius Petita. New version by Sergei Vikharev. Music by Leo Delibes. Live performance 29 May 2011.

The Bolshoi Ballet: The Nutcracker

A masterpiece of classical dance, this Nutcracker is a magical version of the score by Tchaikovsky filmed at the Bolshoi Theatre. Recorded live in December 2010.

Don Quixote (The Royal Ballet)

Carlos Acosta's first venture directing one of ballet's 19th century classics was eagerly anticipated, as was his own starring role in the production (as Basilio), opposite the Argentinian Royal Ballet principal Marianella Nuñez (Kitri). Still built on Petipa's original choreography, Acosta's clear dramatic structure and vivid stage action gave the ‘boy gets girl despite her father’ story a more convincing air than usual, with Don Quixote's parallel obsession with Dulcinea-Kitri coherently woven into the plot.

Hans Christian Andersen

A small-town shoemaker with a knack for spinning yarns, Hans encounters happiness and heartbreak on his road to becoming a full-fledged writer.

Bolshoi Ballet: Jewels

George Balanchine's jewel-themed triptych, strikingly choreographed to the music of Faure, Stravinsky and Tchaikovsky. This three act masterpiece is renowned as the world's first full-length abstract ballet. The Russian-born co-founder of the New York City Ballet, Balanchine was inspired by the artistry of jewellery designer Claude Arpels to create a trio of distinct movements revealing the essence of each precious stone. Each part also evokes three different cities: Paris, New York and St. Petersburg. 'Emeralds' was conceived as a tribute to the French romantic school, with music by Gabriel Faure. The fiery and energetic 'Rubies' taps into the rich tradition of Broadway musicals, with music by Stravinsky. 'Diamonds' honours the grandeur of Imperial Russia and the Maryinsky Theater, choreographed to the music of Tchaikovsky. With its jewel-like costumes, this is a celebration of the influences on the choreographer who was described as the father of American ballet.

In Her Hands

Dance film inspired by the life and work of the artists Camille Claudel and Auguste Rodin.

Romeo and Juliet: Beyond Words

As members of the feuding Capulet and Montague families, Romeo and Juliet should be sworn enemies, but they fall deeply in love and marry in secret. That very day, disastrous circumstances lead Romeo to fight and kill Juliet’s cousin Tybalt, setting off a chain of events that culminate in tragedy.

Bolshoi Ballet: La Bayadère

When the beautiful dancer Nikiya and the warrior Solor meet in secret, they swear eternal mutual fidelity. However, the High Brahmin, who is also in love with Nikiya, overhears them. He rushes to reveal their secret to the Rajah, who has decided that Solor will marry his beloved daughter Gamzatti. Recorded live, January 2013.

The Tales of Hoffmann

A melancholy poet reflects on three women he loved and lost in the past: a mechanical performing doll, a Venetian courtesan, and the consumptive daughter of a celebrated composer.

Tales of Beatrix Potter

The Royal Ballet Company brings Squirrel Nutkin, Tom Thumb, Hunca Munca, Jemima Puddle-Duck, Jeremy Fisher, Pigling Bland, and Pigwig to the screen doing pirouettes and pas de deux in this filmed ballet production directed by Reginald Mills. The film more properly belongs, however, to choreographer Frederick Ashmore, composer John Lanchbery, and costume designer Rostislav Douboujinsky. This literal adaptation concerns the shy Beatrix Potter and how, when all of the toy animals in her room come to life, she emerges from her shell and begins to enjoy life. Sequences include a rowdy dance with Tom Thumb and Hunca Munca destroying a collection of plaster food, a midnight pas de deux between Pigling Bland and Pigwig, and a corps de ballet of dancing mice.

The Nutcracker

In 1920s Vienna, a young girl receives a magical doll on Christmas Eve.

Ma Mere L'Oye

"Music is a dream from which the veils have been lifted. It's not even the expression of a feeling, it's the feeling itself." This quote from Claude Debussy describes the musical world of this programme, made up of his own works and works by Maurice Ravel. In the choreography of Ravel's and Debussy's music by Jeroen Verbruggen and Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, fluid lines, dream and atmosphere are strongly present.

Billy Elliot: The Musical Live

In County Durham, England, 1984, a talented young dancer, Billy Elliot, stumbles out of the boxing ring and onto the ballet floor. He faces many trials and triumphs as he strives to conquer his family’s set ways, inner conflict, and standing on his toes in a musical that questions masculinity, gender norms and conformity.

Night and Day

When his first stage show fails, songwriter Cole Porter goes off to fight in WWI until, injured, he lands in a hospital. He impresses nurse Linda Lee with his creativity, but their budding romance must wait as Cole heads home. Back in New York, he mounts a series of popular shows, and when his work brings him back to Europe, he eventually marries Linda. But success doesn't spare him from marital complications or bad news about a beloved relative.

Bolshoi Ballet: Don Quixote

Inspired by heroic stories of brave knights, Don Quixote of La Mancha and his faithful servant Sancho Panza set out on an adventure to meet his ideal woman, Dulcinea. Cervantes’ hero comes to life in the Bolshoi's critically acclaimed staging of this exalting performance. With panache and sparkling technique, principal dancers Ekaterina Krysanova and Semyon Chudin lead the spectacular cast of toreadors, flamenco dancers, gypsies, and dryads in virtuosic dancing that is quintessential Bolshoi. Captured live on April 10, 2016

Bolshoi Theatre: ballet Esmeralda

La Esmeralda is a ballet in three acts and five scenes, inspired by the novel Notre-Dame de Paris by Victor Hugo, originally choreographed by Jules Perrot to music by Cesare Pugni, with sets by William Grieve and costumes by Mme. Copère.

Royal Opera House: Swan Lake

The Royal Ballet performs Tchaikovsky's classic ballet, choreographed by Liam Scarlett and starring Marianela Nunez as Odette/Odile and Vadim Muntagirov as Prince Siegfried.

The ROH Live: The Dream / Symphonic Variations / Marguerite and Armand

The Dream: Frederick Ashton’s delightful interpretation of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream is a classic of The Royal Ballet’s repertory. Symphonic Variations: Ashton was inspired to create a ballet on the four seasons – but as he began to choreograph he refined and purified until the ballet shook off its original meaning, emerging as an abstract celebration of movement and physicality. Marguerite and Armand: Marguerite, a Parisian courtesan, lies on her deathbed. She recalls her tragic love affair with Armand in a series of feverish flashbacks.

When the Fern Blooms

Part folklore, part opera-ballet, this féerie presents local pagan traditions on the day of the summer solstice and historical events from Cossack times to the more recent 2014 Ukrainian Revolution of Dignity.

The Rite of Spring

Characters from Haitian folklore come to life telling their story of ritual, ceremony and celebration. All wait to be overcome by the female spirit Erzuli. Who will be chosen?

Romeo and Juliet

Two young lovers, offspring of the feuding Montague and Capulet families, value feelings above the past, pitting love and forgiveness against hatred and revenge.

Marcos Morau : La Belle au bois dormant

Plot unavailable

Pippi Longstocking

Pippi Longstocking, a superhuman girl, extremely strong, redhead with pigtails and freckles, moves to Villa Villekulla, a wooden house located in a small town, together with her monkey, Mr. Nilsson, and her horse, Little Old Man. She soon befriends the children who live next door, Tommy and Annika, with whom she will live many fun adventures. (At Finnish National Opera and Ballet, December 14, 2019.)

Dracula: Pages from a Virgin's Diary

A cinematic version of the Royal Winnipeg Ballet's adaptation of Bram Stoker's gothic novel Dracula. Filmed in a style reminiscent of silent Expressionist cinema of the early 20th century (complete with intertitles and monochrome photography), it uses dance to tell the story of a sinister but intriguing immigrant who preys upon young English women.

Paris Opera Ballet: Tribute to Jerome Robbins 2

Jerome Robbins considered the Paris Opera Ballet as his second home after the New York City Ballet. This production in his honour brings together works displaying the infinite diversity of his sources of inspiration and his genius on stage. Be it in the energy of the large-scale Glass Pieces or the intimate sweetness of Afternoon of a Faun and A Suite of Dances, there emerges that rare capacity to make bodies follow the flow in a living comprehension of music. As the celebrated ballet Fancy Free, a veritable theatrical portrait of an era, enters the repertoire, Robbins reveals another facet of his talent.

Nutcracker: The Story of Clara

This acclaimed adaptation of Tchaikovsky's fabled masterwork from Graeme Murphy and the Australian Ballet tells the story of a famous Russian ballerina who immigrates to Australia in the 1940s, only to find a newly tumultuous life awaiting. Noel Smith conducts the State Orchestra of Victoria, and Vicki Attard, Siobhan Elsmann, Steven Heathcote and Dame Margaret Scott star in this 1994 production.

The Nutcracker

On Christmas Eve, a little girl named Marie falls asleep and dreams herself into a fantastic world in which her toys become larger than life. She meets up with the Nutcracker Prince who takes her on a journey to his kingdom and defends her from the Mouse King.

Nutcracker: The Motion Picture

In this Pacific Northwest Ballet performance, it is Christmas Eve and festivities are underway. Clara is excited when her godfather arrives with a bag full of gifts, one of which is an intriguing wooden nutcracker. That night, while the household sleeps, Clara visits the Christmas tree to inspect her nutcracker and soon finds herself immersed in a dream world both dark and enchanting.

The Winter's Tale (The Royal Ballet)

The story follows the destruction of a marriage through consuming jealousy, the abandonment of a child and a seemingly hopeless love. Yet, through remorse and regret – and after a statue comes miraculously to life – the ending is one of forgiveness and reconciliation. Wheeldon continues his highly successful collaboration with designer Bob Crowley and composer Joby Talbot, the team behind Alice, in one of the highlights of The Royal Ballet Season.

The Company

Ensemble drama centered around a group of ballet dancers, with a focus on one young dancer who's poised to become a principal performer.

The Royal Ballet: The Nutcracker

Clara is given an enchanted Nutcracker doll on Christmas Eve. As midnight strikes, she creeps downstairs to find a magical adventure awaiting her and her Nutcracker. Recorded on stage 3 December 2018—15 January 2019 as part of the Autumn 2018/19 season.

Royal Opera House: Don Quixote

Don Quixote and his servant Sancho Panza set out to have a chivalrous adventure. They meet Kitri and Basilio, a young couple who cannot marry because Kitri's father is determined to marry her off to the wealthy Gamache. Don Quixote decides to intervene. It was on stage 15 February—4 April 2019 as part of the Winter 2018/19 season.

The Phantom of the Opera at the Royal Albert Hall

A disfigured musical genius, hidden away in the Paris Opera House, terrorises the opera company for the unwitting benefit of a young protégée whom he trains and loves. The 25th anniversary of the first public performance of Phantom of the Opera was celebrated with a grand performance at the Royal Albert Hall in London.

Starstruck: Gene Kelly's Love Letter to Ballet

In 1960, American dancer and actor Gene Kelly created for the Paris Opera Ballet an original choreography that was highly acclaimed at the time, yet rarely performed thereafter; a genius work that the Scottish Ballet, accompanied by the stirring and evocative score by composer and pianist George Gershwin, epitome of orchestral jazz, brings back to life sixty years later.

The Champion

Eikichi Yamashiro, who is a former contender for the boxing title, works as a manager at a Club Champion owned by his fiancé Natsuko’s father. He lost a title match five years ago as he was besotted by Natsuko, but Eikichi actually cannot give up the dream of the championship. One day, he meets Shuntaro Fuma, who is a punk kid but a promising boxer, and realizes the dream that he himself could never fulfill. Then, they together start to train with the aim of the title. Mari Shiraki is an up-and-coming ballerina under the patronage of Eikichi as well. Eikichi forbids Shuntaro and Mari to be romantically involved with someone during their training, however, they start to go on a date.