After a four-year absence the Lindsay Kemp Company returned to the UK with their new production Cinderella.
A major influence in international theatre since the 1970s, there is no doubt that the company perform in a strange, definitive style, attuned to the mind of the originator’s persona. He manages to do this with amazing panache, utilising theatre combinations that are the products of great artistic influences.
Far removed from the bitter sweet fable of childhood we are told that Kemp's inspiration for Cinderella was drawn from influences as diverse as Wagner, Edgar Allan Poe, and Lubitsch.
Lindsay Kemp is unique, definitely a one-off. It would be unfair to describe his theatre as pastiche. Using his vast knowledge of dance-theatre, mime and ritual, he created in Cinderella an environment that was comically surreal and religious – sometimes erotic – certainly not shocking or original today, however transcendent in entertainment.
The production's strength lay in the different performance dynamics of film, theatre and operetta, stimulated to create a piece that successfully caricatured the theatre experience.