Gary Avis Official Website - The Critics - Season 2010

DGV

Imogens Creative Fire Blog
Imogen
June 7,2011
'Gary Avis and Melissa Hamilton again; this is a luxury partnership of astonishing chemistry, and their ease with one another in this tender, soaring, probably hideously-difficult material is simply dazzling.'

The Sunday Telegraph
Louise Levene
May 22, 2011
'There was well matched pairwork from Melissa Hamilton (in Darcey Bussell's old role) and Gary Avis. Just when you fear he's doomed to eyepatch roles, they let him off the leash to remind you what a fine dancer and partner he is. That Giselle lift while walking off stage backwards is a real showstopper.'

[Read More DGV Crits]

Ballet.co.
Paul A
May 26, 2011
Gary Avis was a peerless partner to Melissa Hamilton. Their dancing was full of danger and strength, totally engrossing.

The Classical Source
G. J. Dowler
May 18, 2011
'That said, Leanne Benjamin and Steven McRae fizzed in their sparky pas de deux and Melissa Hamilton caught the eye in her duet with company strong-man and superlative partner Gary Avis, carving a sweep of legato movement which mesmerised.'

The Telegraph
Sarah Crompton
May 17, 2011
'But it is full of confident patterning for the corps de ballet and wonderful duets, most notably a hypnotic encounter between Gary Avis and Melissa Hamilton which makes her seem to fly.'

The Tyro Theatre Critic
Rob Walport
May 16, 2011
'A gorgeous melding of music, design and dance. Using Michael Nyman's terrific "DGV" to propel a ballet whose meaning is entirely elusive but is nothing less than a roller-coaster ride of excitement.Wheeldon has composed four explosive duets, Gary Avis and Melissa Hamilton's in particular absolutely sublime.'

exeuntmagazine.com
Maria Iu
May 16, 2011
'But Melissa Hamilton and Gary Avis draw the most attention, her flexibility on full display as she wraps herself around him. The abrupt pause in Michael Nyman’s music – composed to commemorate the inauguration of the French high-speed rail, TGV – marks a change in dynamics half way through the dance, creating a sense of time standing still.'

britishtheatreguide.info
Vera Liber
May 15, 2011
'Twenty-nine minutes of compressed time, exhilarating, exhausting… no time to stop. And stop they do not - Zenaida Yanowsky and Eric Underwood, Leanne Benjamin and Steven McRae, Melissa Hamilton and Gary Avis, Sarah Lamb and Federico Bonelli - metal made flesh.'

londondance.com
Graham Watts
May 15, 2011
'the rock-like strength of Gary Avis (now partnering Melissa Hamilton in place of Darcey Bussell)'

The Arts Desk
Ismene Brown
May 14, 2011
'Still better, though, are Gary Avis and the classy Melissa Hamilton (in Darcey Bussell’s original role), with Avis effortlessly bearing Hamilton aloft with the instinctive fastidiousness of a porter carrying an ostrich-skin valise to the luggage rack.'

New York Times
By ALASTAIR MACAULAY
June 24, 2009
'And Mr. Wheeldon’s four lead couples are each given a distinct idiom and some piercing images, most memorably with the third (created for Darcey Bussell, now danced by Marianela Nuñez, with Gary Avis as her excellent partner).'

Sunday Independent
Reviewed by Jenny Gilbert
February 8, 2009
'Nathalie Harrison's spread-eagle float, supported by nothing but the strong palms of Gary Avis, held high above his head, is heart-stopping.'

The Times
Debra Craine
February, 2009
Suggestions of a post- apocalyptic landscape are enhanced by the dark, cryptic couplings. The cast, especially Nathalie Harrison and Gary Avis on opening night, were outstanding.

The Guardian
Judith Mackrell
February 2, 2009
'At its centre is a magical duet in which Gary Avis, holding his partner's leg in arabesque, gently tugs her backwards and forwards so that she seems to float on shimmering air.'

The Sunday Times
David Dougill
November 26, 2006
'and, most memorably, Darcey Bussell and the powerful Gary Avis, he promenading backwards, holding her up high to fly like a beautiful bird, she still airborne when the music is suddenly interrupted.'

The Independent
Zoë Anderson
November 22, 2006
'There's glorious dancing, most of all from Darcey Bussell. Wheeldon has made several ballets for Bussell, responding to her long limbs, her sheer radiance. He gives her an entrance for a goddess; Gary Avis carries her on, held high. It's a moment of wonder: Avis lifts her lightly, letting her swim through the air. She is astonishingly beautiful.'

The Times
Debra Craine
November 21, 2006
'Darcey Bussell enjoys a compelling duet with Gary Avis that is romantic and apocalyptic, encapsulating the mood of shifting perceptions.'

The Guardian
Judith Mackrell
November 20, 2006
'Wheeldon plays brilliantly with dynamic and scale, setting a tranced duet for Darcey Bussell and Gary Avis to the fastest music, so that the couple seem suspended in a hurtling capsule.'

The Telegraph
Sarah Crompton
November 20, 2006
'Gary Avis lifts Darcey Bussell into space, like a glorious plane in flight, and they perform a long athletic ritual of leaving; she turns beneath his hand.'

Ballet.co
Marike van Aerde
November 2006
London, Covent Garden
'Darcey Bussell and Gary Avis perform a pas de deux of such aching elegance, it seems to be suspended within its lingering moments as if a delay of fleeting continuity,' [Close]

Sensoriun

Ballet.co.uk
Paul A.
March 2011
'The extended duet for Melissa Hamilton and Gary Avis suggests a couple exploring space, senses and emotions after the onslaught of a disaster – a deadly tidal wave perhaps. This was the best dancing of the afternoon, a pleasure to see Avis as a strong and attentive partner. Hamilton had ballerina distinction. Together their tremendous rapport created its own suggestive, emotional impact.'

Still Life at the Penguin Cafe

The Observer
Luke Jennings
March 20, 2011
'Zenaida Yanowsky a sophisticated Longhorn Ram, whiling the cocktail hour away in the arms of the ever suave Gary Avis.'

Swan Lake

MarkRonan.wordpress.com
MarkRonan
March 2011
'It was a treat to have Gary Avis as Von Rothbart, both in the white acts and particularly in Act III where he exuded a charmingly dark menace, well-supported by his dwarves. The interaction with his sinister daughter Odile showed skilful sorcery, and this was altogether a Swan Lake to treasure.'

AYoungerTheatre.com
Eleanor Turney
March 2011
'Avis’s Von Rothbart is wonderfully evil, dressed in a feathered, ragged cape, moving in a crouch and exploiting his power to hurt.'

[Read More Swan Lake Crits]

Giselle

Ballet.co
Lynette Halewood
January 12, 2011
'Avis all too clearly thought he was a man doing the right thing, trying to protect the girl he adores from this suspicious outsider: he just doesn’t recognise his own strength when he pulls Giselle away by the arm. His thought processes are clearly and naturally expressed through the body without any exaggeration or histrionics and yet read clearly from a distance. His horror at his persecution by the wilis in act 2 was strongly felt – how could this be happening to me, I was doing it for the best of reasons. Avis is a national treasure.'

[Read More Giselle Crits]

The Observer
Luke Jennings
January 16, 2011
'As the gamekeeper Hilarion, Albrecht's rival for Giselle's hand, Gary Avis eschews the usual homespun decency. His Hilarion is so eaten up with jealousy that he loses sight of Giselle's feelings altogether, and in the shocking brutality with which he reveals Albrecht's identity, he becomes at least the partial instrument of her death, thus giving dramatic symmetry to his own death in Act 2.'

The Sunday Times
David Dougill
January 16, 2011
'Everyone was on top form, Gary Avis acting so clearly and compellingly as the forester Hilarion'

The Stage
Neil Norman
January 13, 2011
'while Gary Avis’ Hilarion delivers a spine-tingling account of his prolonged assault by the Wilis.'

Music OHM
Sam Smith
January 13, 2011
'Gary Avis makes us feel for Hilarion as he seems to be on the ‘wrong’ side at every turn: losing out in love to Albrecht, being blamed for brandishing the sword by which Giselle died, brushed aside by Berthe when he wants to grieve for his loved one, and finally drowned by the Wilis simply for being a man.'

Financial Times
Clement Crisp
January 12, 2011
'Gary Avis is a Hilarion sincere, anguished, doomed, and speaking to us at every moment of the drama’s truths.'

londondance.com
Graham Watts
January 12, 2011
'Tremendous praise is due to those stalwarts of the Royal Ballet, Genesia Rosato (as Giselle’s Mother, Berthe) and Gary Avis (as Giselle’s jealous admirer, Hilarion). They both have such notable stage craft and an intuitive ability to project their every emotion and gesture with an unmistakeable clarity.'

The Telegraph
Mark Monahan
January 12, 2011
'Gary Avis’s meddling Hilarion is unsurprisingly terrific;'

The Independent
Zoë Anderson
April 9, 2009
'There's some lovely banter between Gary Avis's Hilarion and Genesia Rosato as Giselle's mother: their mime conversations have the ease of long friendship.

When they dance Hilarion to death, the scene's impact comes from Gary Avis's urgent performance.'

The Guardian
Judith Mackrell
April 8, 2009
'Gary Avis, who made Giselle's peasant admirer Hilarion a marvellous litmus test of class conflict.'

Oxford Times
April 8, 2009
'Gary Avis makes Hilarion a rough but good-hearted man whose actions, born from a mixture of protectiveness and jealousy, precipitate the tragedy. It’s clear he is the suitor approved by Giselle’s mother.'
From The Times

The Times
Debra Craine
April 8, 2009
'while Gary Avis made you care about Hilarion, the poor forester doomed because he had the misfortune to love Giselle.'

Evening Standard
Sarah Frater
April 7, 2009
'Gary Avis was a convincing Hilarion, Giselle’s hapless suitor whose exposure of Albrecht’s deceit dooms them all.'

The Financial Times
Clement Crisp
April 7, 2009
'(And the meagre cross on Giselle’s tomb suggests that Hilarion – the admirable Gary Avis – grieves at the last resting place of a beloved hamster.)'

The Telegraph
Mark Monahan
April 7, 2009
'And that smartest of actors, Avis, renders Hilarion as a nastier piece of work than usual, making his harsh fate seem unusually apt.'
[Close]

The Tales of Beatrix Potter

The Observer
Luke Jennings
December 26, 2010
'She survives, triumphant, and goes on to face further hazard as Jemima Puddle-Duck in Tales of Beatrix Potter, stalked by Gary Avis's lethally charming Fox.'

[Read More Potter Crits]

Cinderella

Classical Source
G. J. Dowler
November 21, 2010
'Gary Avis, company stalwart and character dancer par excellence, here makes far more of the ‘bossy’ Helpmann sister than I remember seeing (I did not see Helpmann). Philip Mosley, in Ashton’s ‘meek’ sister part, has found a perfect foil and relishes the sweet, vulnerability of this put-upon ugly girl. Avis is larger-than-life, every movement, every flutter of his outsize eyelashes legible from the farthest seat in the house; in so doing, he underlines the small-scale nature of much of today’s performances at The Royal Ballet.'

[Read More Cinderella Crits]

Sylvia

The Art Desk
Ismene Brown
November 4, 2010
'Better value came from Gary Avis (pictured above left) who always gives good villain, chucking himself into Orion’s jumps as fiercely as he rolls his eyeballs;'

[Read More Sylvia Crits]