Natalia Osipova is such a particular talent. The force of her personality is so great that she doesn’t so much inhabit roles as devour them from the inside. Sometimes, the energy and the passion she brings to her dancing seems to obliterate everything around her; sometimes – as with her celebrated Giselle – it illuminates an entire world.
So it’s smart of the contemporary Dutch choreographer Didy Veldman to put Osipova at the centre of a new version of Carmen (this was its London premiere) that not only allows her to shade an interpretation of Mérimée’s alluring heroine – made famous by Bizet’s opera – but also imagines a backstage process where she puts the full force of her acting skills to work.
