In one slapstick scene in Hobson's Choice, a suitor tries to practise giving a carnation to his girlfriend only to have it stick under his hat. In another, a father staggers in drunk, attempting not to wake his daughters and just missing the whisky glass when trying to pour himself a nightcap. The farce is worthy of Buster Keaton, but this is no cinematic comedy.
Rather, it is an unlikely ballet about a shoe shop by British choreographer David Bintley that will have its Hong Kong premiere with the Birmingham Royal Ballet this weekend. You can take people who love ballet - but also those who don't: everyone should be happily surprised.
It is based on a rags-to-riches play about the marriage of a shoe shop owner's daughter, Maggie, to bootmaker Will Mossop, and about how Maggie and her two sisters persuade their father to agree to it. In the end he has no option, hence the title Hobson's Choice, a phrase that means no choice at all.
The whisky moment that begins the piece is in part an homage to Sir Frederick Ashton, one of the greatest British choreographers of all time, best known for his delightful Tales of Beatrix Potter. Bintley may have been the last person in the company to see him alive. It was a time when Bintley's own, extremely successful dance career was ending and his new career as a choreographer was just beginning.
'It was 1988 and the company had gone on tour to Australia, but I was going out a little bit later,' recalls Bintley, artistic director of the Birmingham Royal Ballet.
'And Fred asked me why not come round to tea, so I did. I went there at about 3 o'clock and left at 11, and just got utterly smashed. There was no tea in sight and all we did was drink whisky.'
