Matthew Bourne’s production of The Red Shoes will make its world premiere in November ahead of an eight week Christmas season.
The production will open at The Theatre Royal Plymouth on 1st November and Manchester’s Lowry, followed by an eight week season at Salder’s Wells in London from 6th December until 29th January 2017.
The Red Shoes tells the story of a girl named Victoria Page whose dream is to be the greatest dancer in the world.
She lives to dance, but her focus is distracted when two men from the dance world fall in love with her.
The story of the Red Shoes was first featured in a film of the same name in 1984, which was based on an original story by Hans Christian Anderson.
Matthew Bourne commented, “It has been a long held ambition of mine to bring The Red Shoes to the stage as a dance/drama. It is set in the theatrical world of a touring dance company. It is actually about dance and dancers, a world that we all understand so well.
“However, the film’s genius is to make that theatrical world at times surreal, larger than life and highly cinematic. My challenge will be to capture some of that surreal, sensuous quality within the more natural theatre setting.
The Red Shoes will feature Ashley Shaw in the role of Victoria Page. Ashley is currently touring the UK, playing Aurora in Matthew Bourne’s Sleeping Beauty.
The production will also feature a new score arranged by New Adventures associate artist, Terry Davies, with the music of Hollywood composer Bernard Herrmann.
In the past, Bernard Herrmann has collaborated with Alfred Hitchcock, Orson Welles and Martin Scoresese.
“It has also long been an ambition of mine to bring the incomparable music of Bernard Herrmann to the stage,” explained Matthew. “It has been fascinating to discover how much of this music lends itself to story-telling through dance and this production will, I believe, be the first full length ballet to celebrate his unique music.”
Following its run at Sadler’s Wells, The Red Shoes will tour at venues such as The Hippodrome, Birmingham, New Victoria Theatre, Working and The Alhambra Theatre, Bradford until April 2017, with further dates to be announced.
For more information and tickets visit www.new-adventures.net.
