Beauty and the Beast by Northern Ballet last night at the Festival Theatre.

Arriving with 9 minutes to spare, I made sure to hurry my companion to the bar to stock up on alcohol before the show began.

I took my seat, cup of wine in hand, with a weary "I don't think I'm going to like this". (Oh #middleclasswoes.)

You'll remember (of course you won't) how much I violently hated their take on Cleopatra. Starring (it still makes me shudder) The Asp. What a horror.

I have no love for the tale of Beauty and her bestial lover.

Why, might you ask, had I even parted with money for the ticket?

For the sake of open-minded-ness, let us say.

So the curtains drew back.

There wasn't an asp in sight.

Instead, we had a very pretty boy wearing the sort of short leathery jerkin you'd fancy you'd find Alan Cummings in if he were to host Come Dine With Me. All strappy and allusions to bondage and ever so very (to my simple mind) cool.

Surrounded by pretties in very funky net-ty skirts. And they danced about a bit and set up the premise nicely. Leather jerkin was vain. They all loved him n'ertheless. He pranced and preened. They (in the medium of dance) cooed.


And then.

Disaster.

The bad fairy struck. Disguised (and here they had fun) as some giant hairy beast that turned out to contain three people. Two of which were uglified entourage and one of which was all green and black and spiky and fierce. And cast a cruel spell and turned Self-Loving into Beast.

Then good fairy wafted in. All gold lamé and oh how it floated and wafted around the stage. And the music became gentler and she tippy toed and wafted and it was lovely and consoling.


And I couldn't tell you precisely how but things got a bit better for The Beast.

And then we cut to Beauty and she's being nice to her dad because she's clearly a sweet girl. Then mince on the two sisters. Beautiful costumes again. All lacey and net-ty and sugar almond colours and geometric to show they're nasty. They dance (with their shopping - to show they're materialistic). And - dreadful! - the bailiffs - and bad fairy - turn up. Confiscate their possessions - leaving the sisters running round in very fetching underwear.

But - consoling - gold lamé wafts past and a delapidated van appears and the family decamp to this with some simple meagre costumes and eke out a plaintive existence with what little they can forage.

The father wanders out and - bad fairy - strays into the danger place where the Beast has gone to live and there's some messing about with flowers. And he slumps back (van)'home' with a rose and the vain sisters don't want it but pure sister takes it and sets off to see the Beast.

Until this point, it is fair to say, I am riveted.

Costumes - just perky burlesque enough to have me captivated. Dancing obviously lovely. Music an odd patchwork of things I think I half remember. Set is modest and under control. Some nice effects. The 'wallpaper' of the family home torn down by greedy bailiffs before it's all packed up. The bailiffs' van. The family's van.

Nil by mouth since lunchtime and a cup of wine down and I'm thinking I've seriously misjudged Northern Ballet. Or their Cleo was a terrible glitch. (Bear in mind I used to live for their productions when I was little.)

Beauty and the Beast are doing getting to know you dances. Gold lamé's floating about in the background. And I'm thinking this is inexpressibly beautiful and indescribably brilliant.

And there's the interval.

And here we encounter the American Beauty phenomenon. (A sad and bitter experience for which there's no place here.)

In short, you seek the opinion of others - midway through as the worst of times for this to happen - and your bubble starts to strain to almost popping point.

"I'm not so sure about the music" says my immediate companion.

"I'm quite liking it but it went on a bit" says bumped into companion.

"I used to love them but I just feel they've gone off the boil" says friend of bumped into companion.

And so cmfwood's little head starts ticking over. Well, there was this and that thing that I liked a little bit less.

Half two. And my sceptical eyes have started to scan the stage.

Aided and abetted by the fact that they've clearly more or less run out of story by now.

It begins beautifully. Beauty lying in a big soft flower that looked (yes, yes, Freud, hush) disturbingly sexual. Beast fastened inexplicably to the wall getting frustrated.

He untethers himself. She untangles herself. They dance.

Bad fairy. Good fairy. Some comedy business with a meal and Beast's lack of table manners and the oafish men servants who look far more monster-y than Beast's best greasepaint can pull off. Blah blah blah.

Worse still, in half two, wanton displays of money.

To echo the big soft (sexual) flower, little panels motor out of the side of the flats containing their own (smaller) soft flowers. UNNECCESSARY!

There's all sorts of green UV going on in a monster-y print about the rib shaped side-flat-y things (I know you'll have no idea what I'm talking about). Dramatic but UNNECCESSARY.

There's a moon. A most beautifully painted beautifully lit moon that gets about one and a half minutes of (literal) air time and then it's whisked off. UNNECCESSARY.

And the dreadful disloyal thought pops into my head: this is a company with TOO MUCH money.

I know that's wrong and they won't have too much and they'll be struggling to eke out a hand to mouth existence and every day that they struggle and limp on is another cause for celebration.

But really, little flappy outy panels containing flowers within the flats??

So Beauty and Beast dance. Waft. Witchy (bad fairy) pose.

And I suppose my attention must have wandered. All these vengeful thoughts about wishing I had their set and light and costume budgets.

Because suddenly, dark stage. Then bright stage full of small organ style pipes and something which I thought was the New World Symphony but actually probably wasn't but you'd know it if you heard it. And the dancers all pouring onto the stage wearing paler gold.

And suddenly Beauty is dancing with the handsome man she's dreamt about and Beast (whom she had honourably grown to love) is nowhere to be seen. (Ok, context, Beast had been dancing about before this clutching his heart but I'd seen this as "full of love" rather than "at death's door".) They all dance. It's gold and bright and very happy. I'm presuming it's a dream.

And then.

It's the curtain call!

I am shocked. Shocked.

For where is Beast?

So the Second Half left me as restless dissatisfied as Cleo did whenever it was. This time last year I suppose. Though the costumes were better. And the set - motorised panels aside - felt less gratuitously extravagent this time around.

But my lord, people, I know you're dancing and not speaking. But consider your dullard audience and perhaps hold up a placard saying "Beast is sadly dead but don't worry because he's become Handsome and He and Beauty are now going to live happily ever after".

I suppose that's the trouble with me and dance.