Just before a performance during Tulsa Ballet’s 2023 run at Jacob’s Pillow, artistic director Marcello Angelini suddenly felt the stakes rise. As audience members settled into their seats, he spotted Kevin O’Hare, artistic director of The Royal Ballet, among them.
A year earlier, Angelini had seen a performance at The Royal Opera House’s Linbury Theatre. What he’d remembered as a dreary old space had been refurbished into a “technologically advanced jewel,” he says—one that’s now a London hub for contemporary and international ballet. He envisioned Tulsa Ballet performing there, and when he spoke to O’Hare after the Jacob’s Pillow show, he asked for his thoughts on the company and, later, on them dancing at the Linbury. O’Hare shared the pitch with Royal Ballet producer and Linbury season programmer Emma Southworth, who, according to Angelini, was warmly receptive. (Angelini had also met Southworth at his trip to London the year before.) Even so, he could hardly believe when both said yes.
Now, that conversation is coming to fruition. With Made in America, Tulsa Ballet’s London debut this month, the company has reached a new high mark on its 70-year trajectory. Tulsa joins only two other guest companies, Joburg Ballet and Paul Taylor Dance Company, on this season’s Linbury series. Its sold-out triple bill, running May 13–17, features Yuri Possokhov’s Classical Symphony, Nicolo Fonte’s Divenire, and Andy Blankenbuehler’s Remember Our Song.
International recognition may seem unusual for a ballet company with a moderate-size home city and budget, but considering Tulsa Ballet’s track record, it’s not surprising. Since 2002, the company has toured eight countries from across Europe and South Korea and was named an Oklahoma cultural ambassador in 2007. Stateside, in addition to the Pillow, it appeared at the Kennedy Center in 2010 and twice at New York City’s Joyce Theater.
Angelini says that Made in America aims to represent dance in the U.S. today. Possokhov’s high-velocity Classical Symphony superimposes Russian Vaganova technique on American ballet’s speed, precision, and drive to cover space. Fonte’s Divenire blends American and European contemporary influences, drawing from the choreographer’s training in the U.S. and his career with Nacho Duato’s Compañia Nacional de Danza in Spain. (Among several works Fonte has created for Tulsa Ballet, Divenire has especially resonated with the dancers.) And Blankenbuehler’s Remember Our Song, which tells a story of World War II U.S. servicemen yearning for their loved ones, is the only piece the Tony-award-winning Broadway choreographer has created for a ballet company.
Murray in Nicolo Fonte’s Divenire. Photo by Kate Luber, courtesy Tulsa Ballet.
Tulsa Ballet soloist Edward Truelove, who was born in England and trained at Tring Park School of the Performing Arts, joined the company in 2021. He especially enjoys dancing in Divenire (Italian for “to become”) because it was the first work he performed with the company. Truelove says that Fonte’s piece reflects the company’s culture of teamwork and constant improvement, and he likens Fonte’s choreography to a waterfall—“we’re all coming from the same source, the same stream, but when the water crashes, we’re all individual splashes.”
For Truelove, the tour acts as a homecoming. He looks forward to showing his family and teachers what he has learned at Tulsa and will be dedicating his Royal Opera House debut to his Tring Park teachers, a number of whom will be in the audience.
For Angelini, Made in America also makes a point that American ballet was built by collaboration between immigrants and U.S.-born artists. “We all come from different parts of the world with the hope and wish to contribute to the growth of this great country,” he says. Angelini and three of Tulsa Ballet’s artistic staff members are from Italy and Spain. Possokhov is an immigrant, and Fonte is a first-generation American. In total, 11 nationalities are represented across the first and second companies. “Yet I believe that not only the program, but we as an organization, and the choreography that we’re going to bring, represents what the real America is,” says Angelini.
The post Tulsa Ballet to Debut at the Royal Opera House’s Linbury Theatre appeared first on Pointe Magazine.