Joan Sutherland Theatre, Sydney Opera House
November 29, 2015

Australian Ballet Artistic Director David McAllister once recalled to me his first experience of ballet. As a child growing up in Perth he saw the legendary choreographer Rudolph Nureyev’s production of The Sleeping Beauty, performed by the English National Ballet, and this profound and enrapturing experience would unquestionably be one of the most formative moments of his life. Unsurprisingly McAllister’s own account of Tchaikovsky’s fairytale collaboration with the father of narrative ballet, Marius Petipa, provokes a similar sense of childlike wonder that no doubt mirrors McAllister’s memories of his introduction to the artform.

Yet there is an impressive pedigree that underpins this extravagant staging, drawing on the structural formality that was expected of classical ballet in 1890s when this cherished work first graced the stage. With its historically informed mix of narrative exposition and virtuosic divertissement, this Sleeping Beauty is a display of opulent grandeur and choreographic discipline that any 19th century Russian balletomane would applaud.

The cast of the Australian Ballet’s The Sleeping Beauty

McAllister’s choreography arguably shares its thunder with the...