Natalia Osipova is such a particular talent. The force of her personality is so great that she doesn’t so much inhabit roles as devour them from the inside. Sometimes, the energy and the passion she brings to her dancing seems to obliterate everything around her; sometimes – as with her celebrated Giselle – it illuminates an entire world.
So it’s smart of the contemporary Dutch choreographer Didy Veldman to put Osipova at the centre of a new version of Carmen (this was its London premiere) that not only allows her to shade an interpretation of Mérimée’s alluring heroine – made famous by Bizet’s opera – but also imagines a backstage process where she puts the full force of her acting skills to work.
Veldman’s conceit is to take us behind the scenes with the creative team who are making a film of the story, which triggers reflections and refractions within their own personalities. So Osipova’s Carmen is, when offstage, a lost and lonely soul whose gazing in the floor-length mirror at the back of Nina Kobiashvili’s elegant design of screens reveals her own emptiness.
She desires applause, coming to full life only when she steps into the spotlight – and that yearning makes her revel in relationships every bit as destructive as Carmen’s with her own versions of Escamillo (who is also the fictional film’s director, and is played by Isaac Hernández) and José (danced, in a bit of additional meta oddity, by Osipova’s real-life fiance, Jason Kittelberger). There’s also a cameraman cum stalker in the shape of Eryck Brahmania, and an underused Hannah Ekholm as Carmen’s mate Michaela.
In fact, arguably the best section of choreography is a sympathetic duet of girl-bonding for Ekholm and Osipova, before their friendship is torn asunder when Carmen runs off with her boyfriend. Elsewhere, Veldman tends to rely on a lot of slow-motion folding and unfolding to communicate all the relationships, with the dancers stretching and flipping over the furniture, and across the floor, expressing feeling in elongated limbs and tense poses.
As passions escalate and jealousy runs rampant, the dancers push and pull against each other’s bodies, nuzzling into chests or pushing away with the feet as the mood takes them. There’s a tender duet for Osipova and Kittelberger and a sexier one with Hernández as she finds the lure of the director’s power irresistible.
They are all vivid dancers. Hernández’s sharp lines and etched jumps contrast beautifully with Kittelberger’s more grounded intensity. But it’s Osipova’s show, and it’s her ability to convey emotion with a twitch of her fingers or a wriggle of the shoulders that makes it appealing. Her commitment is palpable, and she brings an electric edge of drama to each encounter.
Just as composer Dave Price jazzes up Bizet’s familiar themes in his electronic score, so Veldman twists and alters the outcome of the story while keeping its lineaments the same. But this is at least the fourth dance version of Carmen that I can recall, and apart from providing Osipova with a vehicle for her starry talents, I am not sure how much it adds to the conversation.
