Reviews & Press Clippings

I hope I’m not talking out of turn but, according to the programme for the King’s theatre’s touring production of Sleeping Beauty On Ice, the Russian composer Tchaikovsky was a tortured homosexual. Not content with “outing” the great man, the brochure then goes on to explode the myth that he died of cholera after drinking a glass of unfiltered water and claims instead that he glugged back some arsenic after an affair with a young aristo went awry.

How different his life might have been today. For starters, one suspects he would have hugely enjoyed the high camp of his romantic ballet score being transformed into an ice-stravaganza and performed by former Olympic athletes in a provincial theatre on a stage flooded with water and chilled to -15C. Fourteen tons of ice covered 10 miles of plastic pipework laid out on the stage floor which were connected to an enormous cooling system parked out on Bath Street in a truck. It would take just one mischievous ned with a pocket knife to cause a bigger mass defrost than Farmfoods’ last power cut.

The show opened in the Dark Forest, home to the Black Fairy Carabosse (costume inspired by Strawberry Switchblade, hair and make-up by Martin Degville of Sigue Sigue Sputnik) and her crew of black-suited imps. As she twirled menacingly around the stage, the whimpering of the children in the audience began.

“Mummy, I’m scared,” they whined, “I don’t like it, is that lady going to kill me?” Had I posed the same question 30 years ago I would have got a sharp, “No, darling, she won’t get the chance because Mummy will kill you first if you’re not quiet”. But the CBeebies generation was permitted to chunter on throughout the show unchallenged by so much as a parental “shush”.

The 23-strong cast of the Imperial Ice Stars features Olympic, world, European and national championship skaters who between them have won more than 210 competition medals. The Glasgow audience may not know a toe loop from a camel spin but there was no doubting the skills of the performers as they swept gracefully around the small space without bumping into each other or the set.

The choreographer Tatiana Tarasova — an Olympic coach of some 30 years standing — has concentrated on virtuoso skating rather than the slavish imitation of the original ballet steps and the smiles on the faces of the cast belied the extreme physical risks they took as they flew through the air and performed 12ft off the ground in skating stilts.

There were a couple of falls, which served, if anything, as a reminder that most people in the audience would struggle to stand up straight on that treacherous stage, never mind lift their partner one-handed above their heads to perform a series of dazzling spins.

The former world champion Mandy Woetzel was charming as Princess Aurora, Vadim Yarkov as Prince Désiré was supremely dishy and athletic, while Maria Borovikovawas perfectly vile as Carabosse. But the audience’s heart went out to Anton Kylkov as the servant Catalabutte who was held responsible for the terrible lapse in palace security which led to the household’s 100-year sleep. His was without doubt the best acting performance of the night, remaining completely focused while 22 pairs of blades whizzed dangerously around him.

By the end of the two and a quarter hour performance even the chattiest children had been silenced — the Imperial Ice Stars had worked hard enough to blunt their boots; the tumultuous applause fully deserved.

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