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‘It was a shock to many’: Matthew Bourne on his Swan Lake with male swans, the show that shook up the dance world
Celebrating the 30th anniversary of his legendary stage production, Matthew Bourne tells the BBC about the show that radically changed ballet with one “big idea”.
The most iconic dance costume of recent times may be a pair of white feathery breeches on permanent display at London’s V&A museum. They’re a tribute to choreographer Matthew Bourne’s gender-flipping dance version of the ballet Swan Lake. The production, which first premiered in London in November 1995, ruffled feathers in many ways because the swans, until then female roles, were played by male dancers. It went on to become the longest running full-length dance classic in the West End and on Broadway, winning both Olivier and Tony awards.
As the show celebrates its 30th anniversary with a 2024/25 tour, Matthew Bourne tells the BBC the story of the landmark production.
“I think most people thought that when they came to see it, they were going to see men in tutus,” says Matthew Bourne, of public expectations back in 1995.
The young, London-born choreographer, then aged 35, had been given the opportunity to stage his own version of Swan Lake at London’s Sadler’s Wells Theatre. It was a cherished dream for him, he says, “because I’ve always loved and identified with the story”. His big idea, he recalls, “was that all the swans would be male. Everything else about the production flowed from that one simple idea”.
I was called ‘the bad boy of the ballet’ – I’m not even from the ballet world – and ‘the Damien Hirst of Dance’ – Matthew Bourne
He explains that he found the meaning in the story through the character of the prince. “He’s constantly being told he needs to get married; his mother keeps pointing at the ring on her finger, which is ballet mime for ‘time to get married’. And he keeps saying, ‘no I’ll only get married for true love’. I always thought there was something else going on there. And that’s where the idea of male swans came from, from thinking about the prince himself. I think he’s obviously looking for something else.”
Bourne trained in dance before becoming a choreographer for television and theatre, and by the early 1990s, had form for putting his own spin on classical ballets. Like the cohort during that era known as the YBAs (Young British Artists) – which included Tracey Emin, Damien Hirst and Sarah Lucas – Bourne was seen as an agent of change in his sphere. He had critical success with his version of Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker, where the setting was a Victorian-style orphanage. In 1994, his version of La Sylphide (called Highl
International
Azerbaijan Airlines says plane crashed after ‘external interference’ as questions mount over possible Russian involvement
Azerbaijan Airlines says the jet that crashed in Kazakhstan on Christmas Day experienced “physical and technical external interference,” according to an early investigation, as questions swirled about Russia’s possible involvement in the disaster.
At least 38 of the 67 people on board the plane were killed in the crash, Kazakh authorities confirmed, including two pilots and a flight attendant. People from Azerbaijan, Russia, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan were among those on board, according to preliminary data from Kazakhstan’s transport ministry.
One passenger told Reuters in an interview on Friday that he didn’t think he would survive after he heard a loud bang and the plane started to “behave unnaturally.”
International
FTX executives shave serious time off their sentences
Ryan Salame and Caroline Ellison, FTX executives convicted for their roles in the notorious crypto fraud led by their former boss Sam Bankman-Fried, have both shaved time off their lengthy prison sentences.
Salame, a former top executive of FTX, the now-bankrupt cryptocurrency trading platform, pleaded guilty to criminal fraud charges in September 2023, and was sentenced in May to 7 1/2 years in federal prison. He began his sentence in October. But the Federal Bureau of Prisons currently lists his release date as March 1, 2031, more than a year earlier than his initial release date in April 2032. Business Insider first reported Salame’s new release date.
Ellison, Bankman-Fried’s former girlfriend and the former CEO of FTX’s hedge fund arm, Alameda Research, was sentenced to 2 years in prison after she pleaded guilty to seven federal counts of fraud and conspiracy and was a key witness against Bankman-Fried. Her current release date is listed as July 20, 2025, three months earlier than her initial release date.
Bankman-Fried, who was sentenced to 25 years in prison, does not have a release date listed on the prisons website.
The Bureau of Prisons didn’t immediately respond to CNN’s request for comment. However, in several past statements about early release dates, the bureau has told CNN that it does not comment on the conditions of any individual inmate, but inmates can earn good conduct time that is calculated into their projected release date.
Qualified inmates are currently eligible for up to 54 days of GCT time for each year of the sentence imposed by the court. Inmates have other ways of earning time credits while incarcerated, including participation in various prison programs.
FTX was a high-profile crypto startup that allowed people to buy and sell digital assets. It had its name emblazoned on an arena in Miami and on every Major League Baseball umpire’s jersey. The exchange had several celebrity endorsers and was widely believed to be a gold-standard for safety and security.
But FTX collapsed in November 2022 when customers pulled their funds as rumors spread about FTX’s unusually close ties to its founder’s crypto hedge fund, Alameda
International
‘It’s a scary time’: US universities urge international students to return to campus before Trump inauguration
Fear and uncertainty are spreading across many US college campuses ahead of President-elect Donald Trump’s January 20 inauguration, with some schools advising international students to return early from winter break amid promises of another travel ban like the one that stranded students abroad at the start of Trump’s last term.
In a country where more than 1.1 million international students enrolled in US colleges and universities during the 2023-24 academic year, the former president has pledged more hardline immigration policies upon his return to the White House, including an expansion of his previous travel ban on people from predominantly Muslim countries and the revocation of student visas of “radical anti-American and antisemitic foreigners.”
International students generally have nonimmigrant visas that allow them to study in the US but don’t provide a legal pathway to stay in the country.
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