Cathy Marston In Conversation with Maggie Foyer
November 4th, 2024
Susan Dalgetty-Ezra, chair of the London Ballet Circle, welcomed Cathy Marston to the evening’s In Conversation. Growing up in a literary family in Cambridge, she trained at the Royal Ballet School, and is now Director and Chief Choreographer of Ballett Zürich. Famed across the world for her choreography, her first work for the main stage at the Royal Opera House was The Cellist. Susan also welcomed dance writer Maggie Foyer, who for the first time would lead the conversation for LBC.
Maggie commenced by rehearsing Cathy’s impressive CV. On graduating from the Royal Ballet School in 1994, she started her professional career with Ballett Zürich but also danced with other Swiss companies. Always retaining her links with England, she created short pieces for the Royal Ballet, and became Associate Artist (Choreographer) at the Royal Opera House in 2002. In 2007 she was appointed Director of Bern Ballett in Switzerland. In 2013 she entered the Clore Leadership Programme and became a Clore Cultural Leadership Fellow. Along the way she has created ballets for many different companies in this country, for instance English National Ballet, Northern Ballet and Ballet Black, and abroad. Currently she is Director and Chief Choreographer of Ballett Zürich, a post to which she was appointed at the start of the 2023-24 season.
So what was it like, going back to Zürich, asked Maggie. A full circle, like coming home, Cathy replied. Walking down the hill towards the Opera House from the apartment….it was all so familiar. There was even a pianist and also some members of the technical staff who had been part of the company when she had first been there years before. When she had first been appointed as a director, in Bern, she had felt that she was improvising on her feet. Now, after six years with that company and working all over the world she felt much more confident about tackling the role.
And the fact that you were replacing the popular director Christian Spuck, who had been in post for more than ten years, was that a problem? Cathy responded that there had been a long transition, as the decision to hire her had been made two years before she actually started in the job. During that period Christian had been very generous and helpful in allowing her considerable access to the company, even inviting her to stage The Cellist during his final year
Spuck had been appointed to Staatsballett Berlin, and had taken with him many members of the Zürich company. That meant that she had to find new dancers, and after lengthy auditions had selected 28 from a total of some 3000 applications. The process had not been as onerous as it may appear; after years of working with companies across the world she had a good idea of the sort of dancer she was seeking, and even which particular individuals she might hope to attract. All in all, the influx of new talent refreshed the company and also, she felt, gave them a fresh start because all had made the positive choice to be there. Ballett Zürich currently has a main company of 36 dancers and a group of 14 more junior ‘apprentices’, and Maggie commented that the company was well known for the quality of its dancing.
Maggie went on to explore the manner in which Cathy tackles her work as a choreographer, always looking for new angles, first citing her ballet …before the tempest…after the storm… presented at the Linbury Theatre in 2004. Cathy responded that Thomas Adès opera The Tempest had been in performance on the main stage and Deborah Bull, then running the Linbury, commissioned this ballet on the same theme. It consists of two duets which form a prequel and sequel to The Tempest. Cathy read extensively, as she always does, research which included The Sea and The Mirror by W H Auden, poems which explore new dynamics between the characters in Shakespeare’s play. Following a trail which caught her imagination, she was drawn to the concept of the contrasting elements of air and earth, a duality which was to prove most significant in her approach to the choreography.
The conversation then turned to Victoria, a ballet commissioned for Northern Ballet by its Artistic Director David Nixon. Again, through research, she was able to bring a new facet to the narrative. She discovered that the queen’s youngest daughter, Princess Beatrice, had lost her husband through warfare and the two women, both widows, and both dressed in black, spent much time together. After the Queen’s death, Beatrice apparently re-wrote much of her mother’s diary material, thus offering a new and possibly inaccurate perspective on her life. A ballet about a very well-known figure, but with a new angle – very much Cathy’s signature style.
In Zürich she is now mounting Clara about the life of Clara Schuman, brilliant pianist and wife of Robert Schuman the composer.
A trailer for the current production of Clara by Ballett Zürich – now sold out – was then shown.
Cathy explained that she had read about Clara in a book by Janice Galloway, a Scottish author who had presented the story in the form of a novel rather than simply a record of her life, and this had for years prompted Cathy to want to choreograph a work based on Clara’s life when she had the time to do so. An opportunity came when she spent three weeks at Cove Park in 2003, an artists’ retreat space alongside Loch Long in Argyll. Taking along with her a musician, a designer, and a dramaturg, she invited them all to flesh out the life of Clara Schuman in balletic form.
Cathy noted that originally she had anticipated the Royal Ballet might want to mount Clara and had been somewhat disappointed when they turned it down. She had then made a studio version with just 14 dancers for Bern Ballett, where she was at the time, which was in due course toured to the Linbury. She liked what she had produced but it was not the Clara she had originally intended, which would have to wait until she got to Zurich.
Her recent three-act orchestral production of Clara for Ballett Zurich involves seven dancers who each represent Clara Schuman in the various and very different stages of her life; as child protegé, artist, wife, mother, nurse, manager and muse. These seven dancers may also represent the keys of a piano, or the notes of music, or even co-exist with representing Clara the woman. The interpretation is in some ways analogous to the cello represented by a dancer in The Cellist and in that sense it was something of a ‘sister’ to that ballet.
Very much a piece for the women, noted Maggie, do the men get jealous? Cathy replied that there were also excellent parts for the male members of the company, especially for Robert, her husband, who dominated Clara in so many ways, for Clara’s father, and for Johannes Brahms who advised Robert and for whom Clara had been a muse for many years.
The choreography was only one aspect of a production, and Cathy referred to Hildegard Bechtler’s set design for Clara, which broadly resembled a grand piano. Costumes involved much pleating, reflecting the scales and arpegii inherent in the music. Every element in a production was important in reinforcing the image and setting the tone of the piece.
She was extremely fortunate at Zürich; the production department was superb and design and execution was of the highest quality, as was the orchestra and music generally. Cathy considered herself very privileged to be a part of such a great organisation. She loves her job!
The conversation then turned to her various collaborators, a talented group of individuals who have been very important in Cathy’s work. In particular she cited Edward Kemp, a writer and dramaturg, with whom she had first worked on Clara at Cove Park but had now collaborated with in the creation of more than 25 ballets, such as Blood Wedding, Ghosts The Suit and The Cellist. Edward was an invaluable and knowledgeable colleague; he had been present through most of her journey as a choreographer, although in the period when he was Director of RADA he had not always been able to commit time to working with her as intensively so she made some works like Jane Eyre, Snowblind and Victoria without him.
Philip Feeney, composer and arranger, had collaborated with her most successfully, for instance on Snowblind, Victoria and The Cellist. Hildegard Bechtler provided set and costume designs for Clara and The Cellist. Although Cathy tried not to employ the same designers time after time, in order to keep a degree of freshness with each production.
She also mentioned Thomas Newman, Hollywood star composer, with whom she had collaborated on Of Mice and Men for the Joffrey Ballet in Chicago. Ashley Wheater (Artistic Director of the Joffrey Ballet) had asked Cathy who should write the music for the ballet. She had replied Thomas Newman, a composer clearly steeped in American music, while certainly not imagining that he would have any interest in collaborating with the company. However, Joffrey Ballet was able to set up a call with the great man in Los Angeles. They met, got on famously from the start, and then the pandemic struck. They became Covid buddies, in touch every Wednesday night for months, until eventually they were able to get together to mount the ballet for Joffrey in 2022.
Atonement was the next work to be discussed.
A trailer for the production of Atonement by Ballett Zürich was then shown.
Cathy had read Ian McEwan’s novel of love and war when it appeared in 2001 and knew from that moment that she should choreograph it. But it was a long novel and would clearly make a full-length ballet, for which it was often difficult to get a commission. In any case, was it a suitable subject for dance? She recalled David Nixon’s admonition that to attract an audience people must be able to imagine the theme as a ballet. Jane Eyre, for instance, seemed immediately plausible; would McEwan’s novel be acceptable?
She had been working with Ashley Wheater on the Joffrey Ballet’s production of Jane Eyre, and he was one of the first people with whom she discussed the potential for Atonement. He knew the book, liked working with Cathy and was very positive. However, it was at this point that she received a phone call, completely out of the blue, offering her the post at Zürich and seeking a quick decision – and of course she had to say yes.
In one of her early meetings at Zürich, with the then Financial Director, he had asked if there was any ballet she was extremely keen to produce; Cathy blurted out ‘Atonement’! Fortunately he also knew McEwan’s books very well and immediately agreed, saying that he thought that even with such a title the Swiss audience would be attracted to see it. Accordingly, Cathy called Ashley, told him of her new position in Switzerland, and suggested they stage it as a joint production.
Several years before, when Cathy was first considering making the ballet with a small company in London which she was running, she had met Ian McEwan and gained his approval for the project. Now the project actually seemed about to get under way she asked whether he wanted involvement with it; he replied that he trusted Cathy to do a good job.
She wanted to make small adjustments to the story; to make the main figure a choreographer rather than a writer. She also wanted to ensure this was historically possible, McEwan’s books always being noted for their historical accuracy. Gillian Lynne, she found, was a dancer who had gone on to make her name as a choreographer during more or less the period in which the novel was set. Thus, while the work was in no way biographical of Gillian, Cathy felt that her career path might form the sort of trajectory on which she might base her characterisation. Cathy reported delightedly that after seeing the work, McEwan had said that while he always attempts to keep his characters at arm’s length to maintain objectivity, Cathy’s ballet had him completely emotionally ambushed.
What qualities do you look for in a dancer, asked Maggie. A very high level of technique in both classical and contemporary dance, she replied. But also someone who will collaborate with the choreographer so that a role can be developed together. They should want to tell stories; to bare their soul. She recalled a recent show which, unusually, she watched from the wings. Seen at close quarters the commitment of each and every one of her dancers was so impressive!
That led on to discussion about the role of the ensemble in Cathy’s works. She replied that it was sometimes necessary to build in some, maybe abstract, ideas to provide roles for the male members of the company. She recalled that David Nixon had requested from her a cast list for Jane Eyre and responded by asking her where were the men? There had been only four in her cast list, and he had to keep the men usefully employed. And so Cathy had to revisit the story and devise roles for the men – parts which challenge Jane, reflect her emotions, perhaps give form to her inner demons.
Lady Chatterley’s Lover takes this concept a bit further. The corps members express and amplify the emotions of the main protagonists, the ‘human matter compressed’ which is the coal, the environment of the ballet. That concept had already been used to good effect in The Cellist in which Cathy asks the ensemble to imagine the whole stage is an like an audio-library of the music that Jacqueline du Pré performed and they are music lovers, listening to her music making and sharing moments of her life-story together. Cathy is always fascinated to discover just how much can be expressed through movement, without recourse to extra objects.
As a modern choreographer, Cathy, like Christopher Wheeldon, has worked widely in the United States as well as in Europe, obviously comfortable in both spheres. Were there any significant trans-Atlantic differences, she was asked. Probably such differences as exist are due to the different cultures and types of organisation, she responded. There were certainly differences in popular culture. For instance, Jane Eyre slotted easily into Northern Ballet’s repertoire because the dancers were naturally aware not just of the story, but of the way in which English people would have behaved at the time. Mounting that ballet in the States involved much early discussion of British culture, of class, the power dynamics of the time. She guessed that Of Mice and Men would be a similar challenge to mount in this country.
When approaching a new work you must have clear ideas of what you want to achieve; a vision of the end result. You must be confident and inspire confidence in turn; you must be friendly and willing to listen to ideas. When first in Bern Cathy would prepare lengthy lists of words, relevant to the theme, which she employed to spark the imagination, so as to discover how such words might be interpreted by the dancers. These days, however, schedules were usually tight and therefore short cuts had to be found. Seldom would she have the time, nor a large group of dancers to work with at the start of the creative process. Of course the dancers’ own inputs to the creative process remained important, but Cathy herself might offer more choreographic direction and suggestions earlier on rather than begin with individual task-work.
So could you create a ballet around any subject? A politician, Donald Trump, for instance? Cathy was not sure; she would shy away from subjects which involved, for example, too much legal detail or money matters. She had always been attracted to Hedda Gabler but felt it was too pernickety a story to relate successfully. Similarly with Ada Lovelace, she could not yet see a way to shape her story. Cathy was questioned as to whether she considered emotion driven narratives different from the English classical ‘tradition’. She responded that she loves emotions but tries to bridge the two approaches. And she feels that today’s audiences can cope with whatever approach she takes! Does she always insist on live music? I never make a hard rule, she said, and one has to be pragmatic.
Finally Maggie asked about the inspiration behind The Cellist. Kevin O’Hare had asked her to make a ballet, and she had given him a couple of suggestions, one of which involved Jacqueline du Pré as a possible subject for a piece. Cathy’s sister had brought the idea to her, and it had clicked because some time before she had experimented with using a dancer to ‘be’ a cello. Cathy, as usual, read the relevant biographies but, of course, du Pré was not an individual from the past and there were many who also remembered her as the vivacious cellist and person that she was. Both Cathy and Kevin O’Hare went to Berlin to see Daniel Barenboim, her ex-husband, to seek his permission to make the piece. Working with the dancers had been absolutely magical, and together she felt they had captured the spirit of the individual.
Philip Feeney produced a terrific score which reflected her life but which, originally, was not going to include the famous Elgar Cello Concerto for which du Pré is best remembered, on the grounds that it was so well known that it might detract from the ballet. However, with an initial draft of the music written, they all realised that they could not possibly leave it out and so Philip re-worked the score, incorporating the Elgar and inserting tiny motifs from it through the work.
In concluding the evening, Susan, chair of the London Ballet Circle, thanked both Cathy and Maggie most sincerely for taking part in the evening’s conversation, which had seemed just like a meeting between friends. Cathy had shown herself to be a fascinating individual and a most inventive choreographer, and the evening had been both extremely interesting and entertaining.
