Who invited Judas?: The Judas Tree and Song of the Earth at the ROH
The Judas Tree / Song of the Earth
The Royal Ballet, English National Ballet
Royal Opera House
Balcony D30, £6
24 October 2017
ROH page
What I didn’t expect from The Judas Tree was to feel nothing. The ballet is infamous for its gang rape, double murder and suicide, and notorious ambiguity on the culpability of its victims. There exist screeds of writing exploring the meaning and origin of its symbolism. And yet in the context of the ballet itself all this interest and emotion seem incomprehensible. The Judas Tree is simply a mediocre ballet.
The content of the story means it’s not very pleasant, but neither is it particularly challenging. The inch-thick symbolism even masks the horror of the events depicted: it’s obvious from the get-go that these aren’t real characters but only carriers for imagery from stories not their own. Brian Elias’s entertaining score provides no help – though no doubt interesting as a concert piece, for the ballet it fails to signpost significant events, seemingly disinterested. MacMillan, as usual, maps his intricate steps closely on the music, but without a narrative import, and in such a context, his artistry and that of his dancers become nothing more than exercises on stage. It’s a shameful waste of the talent the RB has lavished on this revival.
Oh well. We’re on safer ground with the lovely Song of the Earth, although it must no doubt have felt slightly different from the perspective of ENB, taking on this complex work for the first time, and on an unfamiliar stage. It’s discombobulating and not entirely flattering to the ENB to see such an RB stalwart performed by a different company on the ROH stage – not that ENB is in any way bad; it’s more that the dancers don’t quite make the most of the gently recurring symbolism and it’s tight step with music and text. No doubt Stuttgart aficionados felt the same seeing the RB perform the work for the first time.
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