When Kenneth MacMillan’s Mayerling was premiered in February 1978, it was revolutionary, taking the three-act ballet into real-life realms of psychosis and misery that it had never explored before. True, it featured a prince, but Crown Prince Rudolf, heir to the Austro-Hungarian empire, was nobody’s idea of a dreamboat: riddled with syphilis, addicted to morphine, involved in plots against his father, he met his death in a suicide pact at Mayerling with his 17-year-old lover, Mary Vetsera, a scandal that was instantly covered up.
All these years on, it still feels radical. Powered by a score of Liszt excerpts assembled by John Lanchbery (and played with passion by the orchestra under Koen Kessels), set by Nicholas Georgiadis among glowing autumnal colours, its imaginative, inventive confidence is truly astonishing.
At the start of this long run of performances, which allow a rich variety of the Royal Ballet’s current dancers to get their bodies around its intricate choreography and their minds into its subtle psychology, different scenes suddenly shone out. Sometimes, the sections about the Hungarian plotters seem dull; here, as danced by Reece Clarke, Leo Dixon, Nicol Edmonds and Calvin Richardson, they sprang to vital life, full of sharp twists and turns and high, fierce jumps. In the tavern scene, Marianela Nuñez brought a soft sensuality to Mitzi Caspar, the prostitute plotting for her life.
Francesca Hayward’s terror and disgust animated Stephanie, the bride who realises she has made the marriage deal from hell; Laura Morera brought a world-weary sadness to Larisch, Rudolf’s mistress turned procurer. Natalia Osipova found childlike idealism and a compassionate understanding as Mary. Her energy and empathy push Ryoichi Hirano’s Rudolf over the edge of agony.
The ballet gripped from beginning to end, fresh-minted in the moment, in the identification of the dancers with their roles. It’s an astounding, engrossing achievement, a modern classic that does not wane.
