Matthew Bourne to bring The Red Shoes to the stage in new ballet version

Bourne's new production will premiere at the Theatre Royal Plymouth in November before heading to London for Christmas

Ashley Shaw as Victoria Page in Matthew Bourne's upcoming ballet The Red Shoes

Sir Matthew Bourne is bringing a ballet version of Oscar-winning film The Red Shoes to the stage.

The award-winning English choreographer is renowned for his contemporary reworkings of classics, memorably casting an all-male ensemble for his 1995 Swan Lake.

His latest production was announced on Tuesday morning and will premiere at the Theatre Royal Plymouth on 21 November, before moving to Sadler’s Wells in London on 6 December for eight weeks.


 Principal dancer Ashley Shaw with choreographer Sir Matthew Bourne

The original 1948 movie follows talented ballerina Victoria Page as she rises to become the principal dancer in a new ballet based on Hans Christian Andersen’s fairytale The Red Shoes, about a young woman bewitched by a pair of red shoes. Soon enough, Victoria finds that her life begins mirroring the tragic role she is dancing.

Ashley Shaw, principal dancer for Bourne’s New Adventures company, will take the lead role as Victoria after she finishes performing as Aurora in his gothic Sleeping Beauty, which is currently touring the UK.

Matthew Bourne's Sleeping Beauty is currently touring the UK (Johan Persson)

Bourne told reporters at London’s Savoy Theatre that it was a “long held ambition” to take on The Red Shoes. “It is set in the theatrical world of a touring dance company,” he said. “It is actually about dance and dancers, a world that we all understand so well.

“However, the film’s genius is to make that theatrical world at times surreal, larger than life and highly cinematic. My challenge will be to capture some of that surreal, sensuous quality within the more natural theatre setting.”

Legendary Hollywood composer Bernard Herrmann’s original score “lends itself to storytelling through dance”, with the production set to be “the first full-length ballet to celebrate his unique music.”