Trocks In Frocks: Tutu Good!

Cartwheeling ballerinas, men on pointe and eyelashes that would put the Kardashians to shame: the world’s biggest comedy drag ballet company is back in town!

It’s nine years since I last saw Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo at Bradford’s Alhambra and, even then, they were almost four decades old: now the company’s knocking on the door of 50.

But with a corps of wonderful dancers – equally skilled at drag make up as they are facial expressions – ranging from 22 to 47, it’s safe to say that the ‘Trocks’ are here to stay at least a few decades longer!

Born in America but now the property of the world – they have performed in over 35 countries, including seasons at Moscow’s Bolshoi Theater – this comedy dance company makes no bones of the fact that they are, in reality, ‘Ballerina boys’!

Boys will be boys….unless of course they’re the girls! Be it a pas de deux or a pas de trois, boy can these boys get those legs up whether they’re in Nureyev-style tights or, indeed, an immaculate tutu.

And for that there is loud applause because the Trocks all trained at some of the best schools in the world and, these days, joining the company is as much a career choice as it was derided in the mid 70’s when it first came into being in New York.

But, since then, the Trocks have discarded most of those societal preconceptions by entering the mainstream and, as I said all those years ago, this company reminds me of another ‘Les’…..the comedian Les Dawson.

He was brilliant at playing the piano badly but he was only able to do so because he was such a talented pianist. And, so it is with the Trocks. They really are to be admired as dancers and, with a full-time ballet mistress overseeing rehearsals and in the region of 100 performances a year, this is no longer ‘a bit of fun’:

In some ways comedy is one of the unsung heroes of performance for it takes hours, days, nay weeks, to perfect a glance, a turn of the eye or a simple move that wrings a peal of laughter from an audience.

But, behind the not-so-subtle subtleties, there is a huge amount of talent. All on the stage can dance, and a handful brilliantly, whilst grimacing, admiring the principal dancer’s buttocks, or, mid Swan Lake, momentarily slipping into a move that would be more at home in Oliver!

Laughter is the best tonic in the world and while the nearest you’ll get to a gin is at the interval bar, make haste because the Trocks only have one more performance at the Alhambra….and it’s tonight!