Behind the Scenes Blog

After a year of LCB’s Dance Inspire weekly ballet classes, Year 4 of South Rise Primary had the opportunity to showcase their newfound talents to their teachers and parents at their end of year ballet show. With only a few moments before parents started to arrive, the children hurriedly added the finishing touches to their costumes and make-up (some of the boys grumbling that the girls’ costumes were more sparkly than theirs!) and they wished each other good luck – “toi, toi, toi!” Soon every s…

Today I did the first day of the LCB2 Tour this year. We finished rehearsals yesterday after 5 days and performed to our parents. Today I went to the Meadbank Nursing Home in Battersea and the Ross Wyld care home in Walthamstow. We performed Nanny McPhee as a ballet to the residents staying there. My parts were the Cook, Magic Dust and a Nanny. While I am performing it brings me such joy to see them smile and enjoy themselves, this is what I love about the tour. And although they may not be abl…

No West End stage for us.  No lights, no make up, no live orchestra, no dimmed auditorium and rustle of programmes and sweet wrappers by an expectant audience.  Our stage is not nearly so glamorous.  A communal carpeted living room in a care home, our props neatly ready in the makeshift wings.  Our audience though is just as expectant.  Elderly residents, much older than I imagined, sitting patiently as we arrive. The room is packed.  An elderly lady in her best floral blouse comes shuffling in…

One more rehearsal before the Summer cast of LCB2 sets off on tour this weekend.  We will have spent five days rehearsing a 30 minute production of Nanny McPhee to perform in care homes and special needs schools across London and the South East. I am back in the Dance Attic where I auditioned nine months ago along with hundreds of children.  Now there are only 12.  Such a small group is really fun because you get to know everyone quite well, including the older children who I might not have muc…

Before dust could settle on a single Nanny McPhee costume, they were straight into the laundry and freshly pressed in preparation for our busy outreach season. Within days of the final curtain dropping at the Peacock Theatre, LCB2 Tour Director Victoria Collinson was sitting in front of a wide angle recording of the ballet, going over the music and choreography in order to work out how to compress 90 minutes of complex narrative ballet into a 30-minute abridged version suitable for LCB2’s audien…

It would have proved quite a feat for Nanny McPhee to quieten the enthusiastic roars of laughter at LCB’s schools’ matinee, which took place on 24th April 2014. When the doors opened for the noon performance, almost 1000 children from 19 inner city primary schools flooded into the theatre and were captivated by the pranks and antics of the naughty Brown children from start to finish. For most, this was their first experience of ballet and for some, their first ever experience of live theatre. As…