In recent months, pupils and students of the National Ballet Academy have taken part in two productions by Dutch National Ballet: La Dame aux Camélias and Giselle. This month, some of the youngest pupils of the academy can be seen in the company’s festive December production Cinderella, for which choreographer Christopher Wheeldon received a Benois de la Danse (known as the ‘Oscar of dance’) in 2013. The children will be dancing the roles of the young Cinderella, the young Prince and the Prince’s friend.

NBA2 pupils Kseniia Lavryshko, Lara-Marie Baldrey, Yasemin Chow and Evita Fijnaut will take turns dancing the role of the young Cinderella. Their classmates Tijmen van der Plas, Stef van der Zanden and Mats Posthumus are cast for the role of the young Prince, and Daniel van den Doel, Mats Posthumus and Roemer Vonk (also from NBA2) will take turns dancing the role of the friend of the young Prince. Wheeldon’s Cinderella will be presented in Dutch National Opera & Ballet, Amsterdam, until 1 January.

La Dame aux Camélias
In October/November, Dutch National Ballet presented thirteen performances of John Neumeier’s La Dame aux Camélias, to evening after evening of standing ovations – just like the Dutch premiere series in 2015. Bachelor students Ruben Genet, Gene Goodman, Mischa Goodman, Guus Hak, Yuta Irakura and Philippe Magdelijns performed in the production as auction assistants.

Giselle
Directly after the performances of La Dame aux Camélias, Dutch National Ballet went on an intensive tour of the Netherlands with Giselle, in the highly acclaimed version by Rachel Beaujean and Ricardo Bustamante. Fourteen girls from NBA7, Bachelor 1 and Bachelor 2 danced in the production as peasant girls, members of the hunting party, and second-act wilis. Four boys from Bachelor 2 and 3 were also members of the hunting party.