Lead ballet dancers are excited for Cinderella
BRAAMFONTEIN – It's a new season and there's a new ballet on its way to the stages at Joburg Theatre.
Joburg Ballet has been on an incredible journey this year, serving up a number of top-notch productions and pulling in more audiences than before.
The next ballet production to be staged is Cinderella, so we just had to chat to two of the dancers in the production – Shannon Glover and Jonathon Rodriguez.
Glover has been with the company for 14 years but found her passion for dancing at the tender age of four.
Rodrigues discovered his love for ballet at the age of 10, and moved to South Africa in 2011, following his career goals and joining Joburg Ballet.
In the years that they have been with the company, they have performed in a number of shows including the rendition of Swan Lake, Sleeping Beauty, Don Quixote and Giselle, among others.
Asked about their lengthy rehearsal schedules, Rodriguez explained, “We start from 10am to 11.15am, and then from 11.30am to 6pm, we rehearse.”
Addressing the elitist image of ballet is a challenge still to be overcome by the company, but they’re sure that the nature of Cinderella is sure to make it a hit this season. “Cinderella is very well known and parents obviously have told their children about the story, and now we, the ballet company, are doing the production. Children love fairy tales and so they actually want to watch it,” said Rodriguez.
Glover continued, “All little girls want to be ballerinas and most people have usually done it when they were three or five, but they stopped. So while growing up, they all want to be the princess in the tutu and watch it because they want to see the fairy tale unravel and see Cinderella – and adults will want to watch it, too.”
Both dancers can agree that the highlight of the upcoming season of Cinderella will be capturing the audiences throughout their performances. “In any production, it’s about being on stage. It’s very difficult to describe to someone because it’s like the feeling you get from doing an extreme sport. It’s about holding the stage, telling the story, as the main character, and having the audience become part of the story – that’s pretty incredible,” said Glover.
Cinderella will be staged for 10 performances only at Joburg Theatre from 30 September to 9 October.
Details: Joburg Theatre 0861 670 670; webtickets.co.za
