The greatest love story of all, Romeo and Juliet, will be beamed to Centre Square, Middlesbrough from 7:30pm on Tuesday September 22. Celebrating its 50th anniversary, Kenneth MacMillan’s masterpiece will be the final BP Big Screen of the summer. The production made famous by Prima Ballerina Dame Margot Fonteyn and Rudolf Nureyev, who took 43 curtain calls at the premiere, will be presented for the cinema by Darcey Bussell.
The love-struck Romeo will be danced by Australian Principal Steven McRae whilst the beautiful Juliet will be danced by American Principal Sarah Lamb.
Rich in the swaggering colour and period costume of Verona Street life the score by Sergi Prokofiev, is famous for the spine-tingling ‘Dance of the Knights’. With sword fighting, romance and heartbreak the drama takes the audience from the sumptuous ballroom of the Capulets, the sensational balcony pas de deux and to the stark tomb of the final doomed meeting of the lovers.
Back on stage 50 years after the first curtain up, the production will resonate on the silver screen due to MacMillan’s own love of film. Lady MacMillan says: “Kenneth was a complete movie-nut; he loved film and it’s this passion that makes his productions work so well on the big screen. When choreographing he would pre-empt where audiences would look next, capturing the imagination with every movement and it’s this innate sense of what would work on camera that so often drove his vision for the stage. He also believed in creating real characters with real stories and in a ballet such as Romeo and Juliet the heartbreak and passion will be all the more evident up-close and personal in cinemas.”
To find your nearest cinema go to: www.roh.org.uk/bpbigscreens