Don Quixote

Ballet classic Don Quixote, one of the biggest audience favourites, demands enormous technical virtuosity of its dancers. This season, a new generation of Dutch National Ballet principals will get the opportunity to prove themselves in the multitude of dazzling leaps, dizzying pirouettes and snappy pointework variations. At the same time, the ballet, which is based on a passage from Miguel de Cervantes’ epic novel of the same name (1605 – 1615), makes strong demands on the dancers’ acting talent and sense of timing and delivery. This is particularly so in Ratmansky’s version, where the comic story about the love between Kitri and Basilio – fuelled by Don Quixote – gets a touch of absolute style and chicness, despite all the spectacle and humour. As the ‘icing on the cake’, there are elegant, colourful sets and costumes by the Frenchman Jérôme Kaplan. 

Boundless passion and precision 

As is the case in all Ratmansky’s productions, his Don Quixote also shows great respect for the Russian ballet tradition. The former artistic director of the Bolshoi Ballet – and currently artist in residence with New York City Ballet – based his interpretation on the libretto of the original version of the ballet, created in 1869 by Marius Petipa, as well as on the adaptation made of it around thirty years later by Alexander Gorsky. Ratmansky did, however, add his own elements and new choreography, directing the whole production with boundless passion and precision. It’s no wonder he himself said on the eve of the premiere: “While I may sometimes tire of other classics, Don Quixote, when danced by the right cast, always works.”