Choreographer Natascha Greenwalt loves the music of Swan Lake, but she has a few problems with the ballet itself.
“I don’t see this love story,” Greenwalt says. “I see—there isn’t consent.” To her, Siegfried seems predatory, Odette seems far too apologetic, and the Odette/Odile duality reinforces toxic tropes about women who are either dangerously sexy or not sexy enough.
“Not to mention he’s been presented with every human woman in the land, and he goes for a bird,” she says with a laugh. “Like, you’re never enough.”
Greenwalt decided to make her own version of Swan Lake for the company she co-directs, Coriolis Dance. Working on her piece, Danses des Cygnes, she initially felt daunted taking on one of the most famous works in the ballet canon. But in the age of #MeToo, with women asking for their stories to be heard and sexual assault a major topic of discussion, she also saw an opportunity to bring the age-old work into a very contemporary conversation.
Read the full story at Dance Magazine.
Photo by Johan Persson, via Dance Magazine
