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Boston Ballet takes a leap of faith with Jean-Christophe Maillot's ‘Roméo et Juliette'

Boston has seen many versions of Prokofiev's 'Romeo and Juliet' ballet. The Kirov brought Leonid Lavrovsky's 1940 Soviet première staging to the Wang Center in 1992. Over the past 40 years, Boston Ballet has offered versions by Choo San Goh, Daniel Pelzig, Rudi van Dantzig, and John Cranko. Now, as its 2024–25 season closer, the Ballet is presenting the stripped-down, streamlined creation that Les Ballets de Monte-Carlo director Jean-Christophe Maillot devised in 1996, and it's safe to say Boston has never seen a 'Romeo and Juliet' like this one. Thursday's opening night at the Citizens Opera House slid off the rails from time to time, but stupendous performances from Advertisement Prokofiev's score is a literal evocation of Shakespeare's play; that's why, regardless of choreography, stagings of the ballet tend to the traditional, with sumptuous Renaissance costumes and sets, a carnival atmosphere in the town square, and lots of swordplay. 'Roméo et Juliette' goes its own way. Ernest Pignon-Ernest's sliding white panels and ramps and blocks conjure the backdrop for a dream sequence; Dominique Drillot's atmospheric lighting sets the emotional tone for each scene. Jérôme Kaplan dresses the Montagues in pale tones and the Capulets in darker shades, everything long and flowing and floppy, no two outfits quite alike. Ernest Pignon-Ernest's sliding white backdrop and Dominique Drillot's atmospheric lighting provide emotion and contrast in each scene. Rosalie O'Connor The Prince, Lord Capulet, and Lord and Lady Montague have been eliminated from the cast, along with the Gypsies, the market wares, and anything resembling a sword or dagger. The full score can last close to 150 minutes; here, about a half hour has been removed, mostly ensemble numbers. Thursday's performance, with an intermission after act one and a pause between acts two and three, ran a reasonable 2½ hours. The Boston Ballet Orchestra under music director Mischa Santora was in top form; the erotic Knights' Dance in particular had the weight and accent it needs and doesn't always get. Advertisement 'Roméo et Juliette' opens with the credits — including the performance's principal cast — projected on a scrim while the orchestra plays the Introduction, a nice touch. When the curtain rises, we see Friar Laurence being hoisted aloft, in a crucified position, by two 'acolytes.' Maillot's conceit is that the story is being narrated by the friar, who's racked by regret at having failed the star-crossed lovers. It's a bold idea, given that he's a very minor presence in the score, but it's not a good one. Wearing a clerical collar and acting more like the Revivalist in Martha Graham's 'Appalachian Spring' than Shakespeare's humble Franciscan, this Friar Laurence stalks the action in one-dimensional anguish, his silent screams powerless to affect the outcome. It would be the same ballet, only better, without him. Maillot's contemporary choreography adds to a "Romeo and Juliet" unlike any other performed in Boston before. Rosalie O'Connor Maillot's version still has much to recommend it. His contemporary choreography is, like the costuming, flowing and floppy, but it has an angular quality that suits the music. His Romeo and Juliet are giddy, dizzy, frolicking teenagers; one moment she's backing off when he tries to kiss her, the next she's kissing him. In the balcony scene Thursday, Chae and Cirio were all speed and spontaneity, and their nuances made conventional ballet partnering seem generic. Advertisement A slinky, slit-skirted Rosaline (Emma Topalova on Thursday), who like Juliet is a Capulet, shines as Romeo's first love before a spiky Tybalt (Yue Shi) intervenes. Maillot's jittery, overworked Nurse (Courtney Nitting) is comic but not ridiculous; a sassy Mercutio (Sun Woo Lee) and a peacemaking Benvolio (Daniel R. Durrett) get room to ramble in the 'Masks' prelude to the Capulet party. Lady Capulet ( The delivery of the tragedies in the ballet's second and third acts occasionally feels out of place and uneven. Rosalie O'Connor Acts two and three are less rewarding. A slapstick puppet show in the square anticipates the deaths to come. When Tybalt kills Mercutio, slapstick Mercutio's prolonged death agony, a highlight of the score and a showpiece for the dancer, is cut. Romeo's pursuit of Tybalt is enacted in slow motion, a neat counterpoint to the lickety-split music, but the eventual brutal strangling seems out of place. Maillot is, again, at his best with Romeo and Juliet in the lovers' farewell, where she slaps him for killing Tybalt before falling into his arms and coaxing him back to bed. By now, though, the Nurse's idiosyncrasies and Lady Capulet's histrionics have begun to wear thin. An underused Paris exits the reluctant Juliet's bedroom and is never seen again. After a perplexing sequence with Friar Laurence and the acolytes that has nothing to do with the all-important potion, Juliet in bed becomes Juliet in the tomb. Romeo appears and rams his head into the base of the bier; Juliet wakes and, with Friar Laurence looking on helplessly, strangles herself with a long red rope of sheet that she seems to have pulled from Romeo's body. No Capulets or Montagues arrive to reconcile. Watching this bleak dénouement, you could sympathize with Prokofiev's original impulse to rewrite Shakespeare and give the ballet a happy ending. Advertisement ROMÉO ET JULIETTE Music by Sergei Prokofiev. Choreography by Jean-Christophe Maillot. Sets by Ernest Pignon-Ernest. Costumes by Jérôme Kaplan. Lighting by Dominique Drillot. Presented by Boston Ballet. With the Boston Ballet Orchestra conducted by Mischa Santora. At Citizens Opera House, through June 8. Tickets $32-$232. 617-695-6955, Jeffrey Gantz can be reached at Jeffrey Gantz can be reached at