One of the great privileges of writing about dance is that sometimes you find yourself in a rehearsal room when a ballet is being remounted, listening to one generation of dancers passing on to the next what they have been taught by a previous generation.
One of the pleasures of Links in the Chain, Lynne Wake’s 2021 documentary about Frederick Ashton, is that it allows you to eavesdrop on similar conversations. Screening at a special event at the Royal Academy of Dance in London on Tuesday, with guest speakers including dancers Vadim Muntagirov and Francesca Hayward, it’s a beautifully edited insight into what Christopher Nourse of the Ashton foundation calls “the DNA of what is a national ballet”.
