The Australian Ballet

5 ballets to make you laugh

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Artists of The Australian Ballet, The Concert (Robbins) 2008
Photo Branco Gaica

Tutu funny, ballets best comedies.

Ballet is often seen as a very serious art form. Sweeping scores and dramatic storylines make up a large portion of the most famous and popular ballets. But did you know ballet can be funny too? Taking inspiration from Anton Chekov's concept that “comedy is tragedy sped up”, below are five of the funniest ballets that lean into the riotous and ridiculous and shake up any pre-conceived notions of ballet’s solemn reputation.

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Principal Artists Jill Ogai and Ako Kondo with Ingrid Gow, Cinderella (Ratmansky) 2019
Photo Kate Longley

Cinderella by Alexei Ratmansky

Perhaps the most difficult to believe element of Cinderella, isn’t the magical pumpkin carriage or fairy godmother, but the idea that a man can only recognise a woman by her shoe size. Alexei Ratmansky’s 2013 production of Cinderella commissioned especially for The Australian Ballet leant into the ridiculous aspects of the fairy tale. Switching up a pumpkin carriage for male dancers dressed as planets and leaping across the stage to whisk Cinderella to the ball and giving the ugly stepsisters plenty of slapstick choreography, Ratmansky’s steps are supported by Jérôme Kaplan’s surrealist style designs. With the only understated character being that of our heroine, even Cinderella has her comic moments, breaking the fourth wall to reveal the absurdity of her situation.

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Lana Jones, Gala Performance (Tudor) 2010
Photo Jim McFarlane

Gala Performance by Antony Tudor

The ballet parody that peels back the curtain on behind-the-scenes antics and on stage egomania never fails to amuse with its over-the-top send up of the art form. The ballet begins backstage as the cast and crew prepare for the evening’s performance, a gala featuring three distinguished guests, each representing a school of classical ballet; From Moscow, La Reine de la Danse (Dancing Queen), Milan, La Deesse de la Danse (Goddess of Dance) and Paris, La Fille de Terpsichore (Daughter of Dance). The second scene in Tudor’s short and sweet ballet is as outrageous as it is a vision of technical mastery. As each ballerina attempts to steal the spotlight from the other, the unwitting corps de ballet and cavaliers are victims of the exaggerated efforts of the leading ladies. As a parody of ballet, Tudor ensures the audience is in on the joke, creating distorted movements that are as unappealing as they are difficult to execute. Ending in an all-out battle between the three ballerinas, Gala Performance is a laugh-out-loud production not often seen on the ballet stage.

Ballet Bite

In 2010, The Australian Ballet performed Tudor’s Performance Gala as part of the program Peggy! which celebrated our founding Artistic Director, Peggy van Praagh, who originated the role of the Russian Ballerina.

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Principal Artist Robyn Hendricks and Misha Barkidjija, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland© (Wheeldon) 2024
Photo Christopher Rodgers-Wilson

Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland© by Christopher Wheeldon

With a storyline as wacky as Lewis Carroll’s 1865 novel, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, the children’s story might not seem the most conventional concept for a ballet. Fortunately, choreographer Christopher Wheeldon is known for breaking convention and pushing the boundaries of ballet with his unique productions. Beginning in the “real world”, 19th century England is turned upside down as Alice follows the White Rabbit down the rabbit hole and into Wonderland to meet a variety of comical characters. Including a tap dancing Mad Hatter, and dangerously homicidal cook, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland© balances technique and comedy. Poking fun at itself, the hilarious parody of the Rose Adage from The Sleeping Beauty, executed by the vicious Queen of Hearts is a glorious example of one of ballet’s funniest moments.

Christopher Wheeldon's new ballet Oscar plays at the Sydney Opera House in November 2024
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Artists of The Australian Ballet The Concert (Robbins) 2008
Photo Branco Gaica

The Concert (or, The Perils of Everybody) by Jerome Robbins

Jerome Robbins’ 1956 comedic work is a tribute to the role music plays in ballet. The crucial scores that accompany the otherworldly dancing on stage are works of art in their own right, taking the audience on a journey of imaginings. The Concert (or, the Perils of Everybody) was Robbins’ first ballet set to Frédéric Chopin’s music.

Set within a piano recital, specifically an all-Chopin piano recital, The Concert pokes fun at the how the mind may wander throughout a performance. A keen observer of human behaviour, Robbins’ would often take inspiration from the real-world and insert it into his ballet’s. In The Concert, he projects the audience's potential imaginings onto the dancers, creating a fantasy of foibles.

As the steps on stage become more absurd and the dancers play into every possible mistake, it is impossible not to laugh at their heightened emotion and impending disaster. Robbins’ insisted the dancers not play these characters as slapstick but commit to their humanity. The humour in The Concert comes from the real and desperate behaviour of the dancers, and our own recognition of a worst-case scenario playing out in front of an audience.

The Australian Ballet performs Jerome Robbins' Glass Pieces in 2025
“One of the pleasures of attending a concert is the freedom to lose oneself in listening to the music. Quite often, unconsciously, mental pictures and images form” — Jerome Rob­bins
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Steven Heathcote and Lisa Pavane, The Taming of the Shrew (Cranko) 1992
Photo Jim McFarlane

The Taming of the Shrew by John Cranko

William Shakespeare’s comedy steps up to the ballet stage in John Cranko’s adaptation of one of history’s earliest “hate-to-love” stories. While the original content of Shakespeare’s play is as controversial as it is dated, and the themes of misogyny and domestic abuse no longer a “comedic” aspect, Cranko’s work shows the warmth of the warring couple and embeds a farcical energy befitting of English humour.

With plenty of options to play out the comedic moments, Katherina (the Shrew) and her husband Petruchio battle it out on the dance floor, ballet style. With precise timing and intricate choreography, Cranko has the couple move past their one-dimensional caricatures of machismo and nag respectively to arrive at a place of understanding and love. Cranko’s The Taming of the Shrew updates the original but keeps all the ridiculous vaudeville-style slapstick humour in a genuine and genuinely funny ballet.

Honourable mentions

Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo

Created in the aftermath of the 1974 Stonewall Uprising in New York City, the self-professed “foremost gender-skewering, comic ballet company” delight in entertaining an audience with their unique style of ballet.

Harlequinade
Marius Petipa's 1900 love story based on commedia dell’arte was a highlight of The Australian Ballet's 2022 season.

To discover the Season 2025 repertoire

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