Choreographer Matthew Bourne

HK Magazine: What is it about dance that made you want to make it your career?
Matthew Bourne: A lot of people are intimidated by dance, sometimes because they think it’s a world they don’t understand. But actually, deep down they do: we’ve all got a body, we’ve all got facial expressions, and when telling a story through your body, your face, everyone gets it. It’s so primal, it’s very international. It connects with people in the
most basic way.

HK: Your first great success was “Nutcracker!”, a remake of Tchaikovsky’s classic. How did it come about?
MB: The whole thing about reinventing classics wasn’t what I originally planned. I wasn’t even trained to be a dancer until I was 22. My company was very small to begin with, and the thought of doing “The Nutcracker” would not have occurred to me; it came to me by chance. I loved the idea of having a score that was already written, to tell a story. I thought that if I listened to it, I could find a different story within it.

HK: Was it difficult to choreograph, with your relative lack of dance experience?
MB: I didn’t feel it at the time—I was a bit naïve, and I felt quite confident, because I’d been dancing and been self-taught for years. Having an interest in theater and movies and having travelled a bit, it set into the work I was doing: it still does. Whereas if you dance from the age of 5, when you come to choreograph, you’ve perfected your movements but that’s all you’ve done. I did dance for 12 years after I left college—I’ve fulfilled that ambition. I was quite a good performer, but I was too late. I have to hang on to being a bit of a fan, and loving it still, rather than being a cold professional from an early age.

HK: Does using classical scores alongside contemporary dance run the risk of clashing?
MB: What I’ve found is that working with classical music and contemporary visuals is very refreshing—it makes the audience listen to the music again. Especially with something as famous as “Swan Lake” or “Sleeping Beauty.” It makes people reassess what they feel about the music. Sometimes it may take you by surprise, and you have to decide whether you feel it works. But I’m very sensitive to the music. I try not to put stuff on top that doesn’t feel right.

HK: “Highland Fling” is set in dark, gritty Glasgow. How well do you think it will translate to Hong Kong?
MB: The way I present it is kind of a drug-induced hallucination. The main character is obviously not a happy guy in this situation, and the irony of the story is that he tries to turn this woman who he goes in search of, into the girl he had in the first place. In that sense, it works in any era. I just tried to give it some contemporary relevance. What audiences will get is that it’s contemporary because of the way it’s dressed. Whether people know much about Glasgow, the rough bunch of lager louts or the strong women, it’s difficult for me to know. I think they will, because of movies—one of the films it was based on was “Trainspotting”—and it’s a world people know from other media. The story is very clearly and simply told. It might upset a few people in that it’s not classical ballet: it’s performed by the Scottish Ballet, but there’s no pointe shoes, no tutus. It’s a very contemporary style of movement, but it’s also very funny. But when you travel, you never know if the humor travels or not.

HK: So then—what about setting your next ballet here in Hong Kong?
MB: The first time I came to Hong Kong I was a student, in around ‘87—it completely took me by surprise, and I’ll never forget that first view of it. I love the setting: I’ve been toying with this idea in my head a piece about a single man in the big city, a Hitchcock kind of thing, with Bernard Herrmann, who used to write scores for Hitchcock—for “Psycho” and “Vertigo.” His music is incredibly theatrical and has a strange romance to it as well. It’s also never been used for dance, and hardly ever for the stage. I think a score could be put together from his music, and Hong Kong would be perfect for that.