Liam Scarlett’s adaptation of Pierre Choderlos de Laclos’s 1782 epistolary novel Les Liaisons dangereuses is all about the feels rather than the storytelling, the feels in this case primarily being sex.

Let’s put it this way. Ballet is obviously a place where close contact is a given in the workplace but intimacy coordinator Nerida Matthaei must have been working overtime during rehearsals for Queensland Ballet’s revival.

The material asks for a robust approach to physical relationships and Scarlett obliged enthusiastically, too much so really.

Edison Manuel and Georgia Swan in Dangerous Liaisons. Photo © David Kelly

The ballet opens with the Marquise de Merteuil (Georgia Swan on opening night) having a tumble with one of her lovers over the dead body of her husband (literally – we’re at his funeral) and that’s one of the tamer get-togethers.

From that moment the hyper-entangled pas de deux just keep on coming. A brothel scene feels as if it will never end. Scorching glances and wandering hands are everywhere. There’s a touch of romance here and there but even that is enlivened with an erotic charge.