This season The Royal Ballet will be performing the dazzling Don Quixote and the romantically tragic Romeo and Juliet. Today’s cast announcement brings some exciting news:
Don Quixote
In Don Quixote Iana Salenko, Principal with Staatsoper Ballet Berlin, will dance the role of Kitri at two performances on 5 and 8 October partnered by Steven McRae as Basilio .
Born in 1983 in Kiev, Iana trained at the Pisarev Ballet School in Donezk before graduating in 2000 and joining the Donezk Opera House as a Soloist. In 2002, she became a Principal dancer at the National Opera in Kiev before performing with the Staatsoper Ballet Berlin in 2005. Iana has a wide repertory including Giselle, Princess Aurora, Odette / Odile, Kitri, Cinderella, Juliet and Gamzatti amongst others.
Royal Ballet Soloist Akane Takada will make her debut as Kitri partnered by Steven McRae on 18 October.
Romeo and Juliet
Bolshoi Principal Evgenia Obraztsova, who first performed with The Royal Ballet in The Sleeping Beauty in 2009, will return to dance Juliet to Steven McRae’s Romeo in Romeo and Juliet on 22 October and 14 November.
Evgenia trained at the Vaganova Academy, before graduating in 2002 and joining the Mariinsky. She joined the Bolshoi in 2012 and regularly performs as a guest artist with ballet companies around the world. Her repertory includes Giselle, Princess Aurora, Nikiya, Kitri and Aspicia in The Pharaoh’s Daughter.
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Image: Lauren Cuthbertson as Juliet and Federico Bonelli as Romeo in Romeo and Juliet © Bill Cooper/ROH 2012