For 50 years, the all-male comedy ballet company Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo (affectionately known as “The Trocks”) has been delighting audiences of all ages at sell-out performances featuring their fabulous sense of fun and their flawless dancing.
Originally from New York, the Trocks are now loved world-wide for their sassy spoofs and hilarious homages to classical ballet, where the dancers each transform into two personas, both ballerina and danseur!
Every performance frivolously froths with tutus and testosterone, blush-pink ballet pumps, fierce false eyelashes and prima ballerina attitude. However, what makes this company extraordinarily special is their immaculate technique and daring physicality, surpassed only by their impeccable comic timing.
Review by Stephen Gilchrist
It is some fifty years since I first saw ‘The Trocks’ as they are affectionately called. This was on their first visit to London in the mid-seventies, shortly after their formation in New York in 1974 and, half a century on, if there is a more delicious evening of dance and comedy on the planet, I’d like to know what it is!
It is often said that legendary comedian, Les Dawson’s deliberately bad piano playing, which involved wandering off into a different key, and then another, and another, could only be accomplished by an exceptional talent. And so, The Trocks, the all-male comedy dance troupe, each of whom bearing an unpronounceable cod-Russian name, combines both a laugh aloud satirical take on the conventions of ballet with superb technical expertise and comedy timing.
Fifty years later, and after multiple world tours, neither their reputation nor their entertainment value have dimmed. Over the past 50 years gender fluid dance has moved on, from Wayne Sleep’s take on the four cygnets of ”Swan Lake,” with Sleep in a tutu and tap shoes, to Matthew Bourne’s all male Swan Lake. But none surpass The Trocks!
In the latest presentation at The Wells (which is part of a UK wide tour) these unlikely ballerinas tackle Act II of Swan Lake, with choreography billed as ‘after Lev Ivanovich Ivanov’- a long way after I surmise!- with a manic Rothbart danced by Robert Carte and Andrea Fabbri’s Prince Siegried pulling Jake Speakman’s Odette first one way, then another, against an ensemble of drag swans, tutus aflutter. The mix of terrific ballet with knowing winks to the audience, pratfalls and anachronistic ballet mime is just irresistible.
In a mixed bill, next up was a pas de deux from Le Corsair (after, by some considerable distance, Vakhtang Chabukiani) danced magnificently by Peter Gwiazda and Raydel Caceres, with humour, exuberance and style.
Metal Garden , danced to a techno beat, was a wonderfully clever lampoon of the sometimes incomprehensible and surreal world of contemporary dance, a mix of improbable body bending with hilarious ensemble chicken-Lile trotting around the stage.
Robert Carter gave us his Dying Swan, a famous 1905 solo ballet choreographed by Michel Fokine for ballerina Anna Pavlova to music by Saint-Saëns , feathers being shed liberally around the stage as the bird appeared to be dying of something which could either be stomach ache or consumption- it was unclear! Whichever it was it was very funny
And finally, the piece de resistance, an extract from Paquita, originally choreographed by Joseph Mazilier, with music by Édouard Deldevez, later featuring additions by Marius Petipa and Ludwig Minkus.
With a superb ensemble, one remarkable member of the corps de ballet after another performed some thrilling turns, spins, entrée-chats and extensions and, best of all, the Ballerina performed by Takaomi Yoshino and the Cavalier by Raydel Caceres. The brilliance of the company’s conceit is that because when danced straight, you sometimes forgot you were watching me in drag, so authentic was their technique.
The whole package was decorated with excellent costuming, and lighting.
It looked good, and it was good, In today’s sad state of the world, we need The Trocks!. I could not recommend them more highly as a guaranteed pick-me-up!
LE LAC DES CYGNES (SWAN LAKE, ACT II)
Benno: Jacques d’Aniels (Antonio Lopez)
Prince Siegfried: Araf Legupski (Andrea Fabbri)
Odette, Queen of the Swans: Colette Adae (Jake Speakman)
Von Rothbart: Yuri Smirnov (Robert Carter)
LE CORSAIRE Pas de Deux
MUSIC BY RICCARDO DRIGO.
CHOREOGRAPHY AFTER VAKHTANG CHABUKIANI.
COSTUMES BY MIKE GONZALES
Maya Thickenthighya (Peter Gwiazda)
Mikhail Mudkin (Raydel Caceres)
METAL GARDEN
Marina Plezegetovstageskaya (Antonio Lopez)
Gerd Törd (Matias Dominguez Escrig)
Vera Vidludik (A.J. David),
Polykarp Legupski (Harrison Broadbent)
Vyacheslau Legupski (Vincent Brewer)
William Vanilla (Liam Hutt)
DYING SWAN Olga Supphozova (Robert Carter)
PAQUITA
Ballerina Varvara Laptopova (Takaomi Yoshino)
Cavalier Mikhail Mudkin (Raydel Caceres)
VARIATIONS:
Tatiana Youbetyabootskaya (Andrea Fabbri)
Moussia Shebarkarova (Vincent Brewer)
Minnie Van Driver (Liam Hutt)
Gerd Törd (Matias Dominguez Escrig)
Colette Adae (Jake Speakman)
Varvara Laptopova (Takaomi Yoshino)