Eskapist ballet. Choreography by Alexander Ekman. Music by Mikael Karlsson. Performed 2019 at the Royal Swedish Opera, Stockholm. Stars Oscar Salomonsson (Eskapist ); Daria Ivanova and Sarah Jane Medley (Cone Heads); Jonna Savioja (Tree Queen); Anton Valdbauer and Emily Slawski (You and Me); Joakim Adeberg, Jérôme Marchand, Anton Valdbauer, and Mayumi Yamaguchi (Senior Eskapists); Haruka Sassa and Adilijiang Abudureheman (Classic Duet); Alina Lagoas (Red Hatwoman); and Coralie Aulas, Frida Hambraeus, Luiza Lopes, Kisa Nakashima, Moe Nieda, Natalie Ogonek, Alessa Rogers, Desislava Stoeva, Lisa Van Cauwenbergh, Madeline Woo, Kaho Yanagisawa, Gabriel Barrenengoa, William Dugan, Mackenzie Faquhar, Hampus Gauffin, Hiroaki Ishida, Pascal Jansson, Julien Keulen, Callum Lowden, Preston McBain, Kentaro Mitsumori, Jeremie Neveu, Samuele Ninci, Javier Rojas, and Erik Rudqvist (Eskapists). Also features cello by Erik Wahlgren. Set and lighting design by Alexander Ekman; costume design by Henrik Vibskov; dramaturgy by Carina Nildalen; production manager was Metta Flensburg. Directed for TV by Tommy Pascal; produced by Xavier Dubois; associate producer was Ditte Feuk. Released 2020, disc has 5.1 dts-HD Master Audio sound. Grade: A , sort of, maybe
Ekman usually works with composer Mikael Karlsson to first come up with great original music, which puts him immediately halfway to a great production. Because the music will be recorded, there’s no need for the orchestra pit. So Ekman builds his stage right out close to the front row of seats. Our first shot is actually from a kind of finale that shows how impressive the Ekman stage can be:
But our hero, the Eskapist (Oscar Salomonsson), is the opposite of impressive, as he explains in an anti-soliloquy. To escape or not to escape—that is sort of the question:
The Swedish word “dötid” means “dead time” or the time used to move from one project to another. The Royal Swedish Opera house has a great projector:
This bizarre, surreal show actually has a dramaturg, one Carina Nildalen, who writes a bit in the keepcase book how daydreaming is the foundation of civilization (slight exaggeration). Ekman in a bonus extra suggests that escapism is the key to the creation of his wildly inventive ballet characters and situations. Below, the Eskapist envisions his dream dinner party. Confused about the odd characters at the table? Don’t worry. They all appear in the dancing later. When you have seen the whole show, you will be even more baffled:
Most of all, the Eskapist dreams about a great love, which will, of course, always elude him. Below the Eskapist dreams of a touching duet between Me (Emily Slawski) and You (Anton Valdbauer):
Perhaps the Eskapist can sublimate his romantic frustrations in building a great business or cultural enterprise. See below a glimpse of a fantastic world the Eskapist invents using every hydraulic lift in the versatile stage at the Swedish Opera House:
Below left a close-up of one of Henrik Vibskov’s amazing costumes. Below right is Jonna Savioja as the Tree Queen:
Here’s Alina Lagoas as the Red Hatwoman. Anything goes as dancers shout out stuff that sounds like Swedish gibberish:
Mixed in the chaos are innumerable supporting characters doing their own surreal things. You would have to watch the video many times to take it all in. My favorite supporting character is the lithe dancer below who creates vivid impressions of creatures like earthworms and insects—Ekman should make a piece just to showcase this vivid talent:
We interrupt our review for a moment to talk about Henrik Vibskov, the costume guy here. He is a wild Danish designer of just about everything. Check out his amazing website. Our own Wonk Lewis Chang bought the hat below on impulse in a Hong Kong bargain store at 90% off. Turned out to be Vibskov, who has used black and white stripes in a multitude of ways:
Beef:
Cake:
About midway through the event, a brilliant projector suddenly throws up images on a huge stage screen as a kind of interlude. The viewer in the HT sees the interlude in full screen as if the disc had abruptly moved from a ballet recording into a home movie. The home movie humorously depicts the banality of our hero’s real life at home, commuting to work, and discussing matters with colleagues:
Tired of trying to get the dogs at the office to sign off on his memo, the Eskapist shifts gears and leads a chorus line in a series of tap-dancing moves while begging the audience to applaud—which they cheerfully do:
Below a shot from the Cone Heads duet by Daria Ivanova and Sarah Jane Medley:
Towards the end, the music gets increasingly grandiose. But the Escapist remains the same sitting in the tub dreaming of things that can never be:
The grand conclusion:
These few screenshots only hit highlights of some of Ekman’s ideas. This is the most accessible of the three Ekman Blu-rays that we have reviewed. Everyone has daydreams, and we are all familiar now with surrealism and the theater of the absurd. Print critics enjoyed the show and the Blu-ray. The dancing is sharp, and videographer Tommy Pascal gives us an crisp video file with many clever camera moves. No motion artifacts! Fine SQ and PQ.
I ran a Ballet Wonk Worksheet. I trimmed out the home movie Interlude, which has an insanely fast video pace. Just considering the dancing parts of the show, the pace turned out to be 9.75 seconds per video clip. 59% of the shots show the whole bodies of the dancers. This is pretty good, but it falls short of our standard of 10 seconds per clip and more than 60% whole-body shots of the dancers. Pascal got a good video, but he missed his chance at a great video by working too hard. Now to our grade. We start with A+. We reduce the grade to an A (sort of, maybe) for weakness in video content. Could be the A (sort of, maybe) is too high—but this is the only artwork I remember celebrating the all-too-human quality of indecisiveness. It’s hard to make a funny ballet, but Ekman pulls it off.
Here’s an official trailer from BelAir:
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