KEY POINTS:
A bumbling old grandpops he may well be, with a mop for a horse and a distinctly fuzzy view of reality, but this Don Quixote is just the scintillating, exhilarating, exuberant and gorgeous tonic anyone could need in the prevailing climate of doom and gloom.
Royal New Zealand Ballet artistic director Gary Harris gives the old classic a comic book edge in his new staging and design, with the zingiest colours and sets slightly askew.
Think cerise and magenta, Valencia orange, fluffy white clouds and a sky of cobalt blue. Think glamorous senoritas all swishing skirts, fluttering fans and exaggerated kiss curls under the Spanish sun. Think gypsy caravan in silhouette against a romantic, then sinister, starry sky.Think dream sequence as an exquisite little white ballet.
Then bring all these images to life with some of the best dancing, Petipa-style, yet seen from the Royal New Zealand Ballet.
Yu Takayama is a feisty, flirtatious, funny and breathtakingly beautiful Kitri, in a performance of such character and technical excellence that it makes her departure after this season all the more poignant. She is partnered by the stunning Marc Cassidy, on loan from the Australian Ballet, as Basilio. Shannon Dawson, former RNZB dancer and back guesting this season, is a totally hilarious Father (Chaplinesque with a touch of Hitler) and Abigail Boyle is delectably lascivious as Mercedes. Her hopeless rogue
Gamache, by Paul Mathews, is mostly second-placed by "The Dog" - his mechanical wunderpet - until his drunken duet with the aforementioned Mercedes.
Then there are the glamorous Girlfriends (Antonia Hewitt and Maree White), the sensational Waiters (Qi Huan, Brendan Bradshaw, Jacob Chown and Eliot Rudolph), the spectacular Sailors (Medhi Angot, Jo Funaki and Rory Fairweather-Neylan) and newcomer Angot's charismatic Cupid.
It is all dancing to die for.
Sir Jon, as the Don, teeters and stumbles his way through the plot, always in crazy old character, yet always firmly at its centre and dramatic helm. For the last 20 years of his 50-year career with the company, Sir Jon has played mainly character roles: Drosselmeyer, Captain Hook, The Matron in The Nutcracker, and now a candidate for the dementia unit.
The consummate performer, Sir Jon's greatest secret perhaps, and the clue to his theatrical longevity, is that no matter the role, he is always so 100 per cent loveable.
What: Don Quixote, with the Royal New Zealand Ballet and Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra.
Where: Aotea Centre, to Sunday.
