5 Biographical Ballets

Choreographer: John Neumeier
Premiere: 2000, Hamburg Ballet

Neumeier’s ballet captures the genius and tragic descent of Vaslav Nijinsky, the legendary 20th-century dancer and choreographer. Centred on a single night, Nijinsky’s infamous last performance in a Swiss hotel, it interweaves flashbacks to famous performances and moments from his personal life. These fragments not only mirror Nijinsky’s declining mental health but also contextualise how his struggles and relationships created the man and artist he would become.

The overlapping timelines emphasise how the past is deeply connected to the present—not just for the character Nijinsky exploring his own memories, but also for the audience, who are drawn into the story and made to reflect on his enduring genius in contemporary ballet.

Choreographer: Annabelle Lopez Ochoa
Premiere: 2020, Dutch National Ballet

Expanding upon a shorter work, Broken Wings, created for the English National Ballet in 2016, Frida depicts the life, work, and emotional depth of beloved Mexican surrealist painter Frida Kahlo. The production and costume design, by Dieuwke van Reij, is inspired by Mexicanismo and the colours and symbolism of Kahlo’s paintings. Sixteen incarnations of Kahlo’s self-portraits, performed by different dancers, interweave with moments from her life, literally tied together with red fabric braids, referencing the red lines of connection that Kahlo frequently used in her paintings.

While the ballet focuses on Kahlo’s creativity and emotional world, it does not shy away from Kahlo’s physical reality. At just 18 years old, she was injured in a severe bus accident and suffered from chronic pain for much of her life. The ballet has the character of Kahlo dance en pointe up until the accident, and ballet slippers thereafter, to show the change in her physicality even as her creative output shone.

Choreographer: Cathy Marston
Premiere: Leeds, 2019, Northern Ballet

Not just a ballet about the life of English monarch Queen Victoria, this production is also an exploration of how history is told in the first place. It follows the perspective of Victoria’s youngest child, Beatrice, who was a beloved and reliable comfort for her mother when her husband Prince Albert died. Beatrice was also responsible for heavily editing the contents of her mother’s diaries before they were posthumously published, sanitising anything unsavoury or scandalous that might change how her mother was perceived.

When the more passionate younger monarch on the pages starts to conflict with her memories of the more severe, controlling woman she knew as her mother, Beatrice begins to rip out the pages of the diary, revising history on stage even as the ballet itself tries to reconstruct it.

Choreographer: Christopher Wheeldon
Premiere: Melbourne, 2024, Regent Theatre

Trying to capture the spirit of Oscar Wilde, one of the world’s most famous literary minds, without using words is a herculean task. Woven throughout the story of Wilde’s life, from a rising star in the theatres of London to his infamous trial and imprisonment, are famous fictional characters from his work. The intersection of truth and fiction, fairytales and bleak reality, allows Wheeldon to play with Wilde’s storytelling toolkit of wit and irony via the medium of dance. The inclusion of these fictional characters also allows the character of Wilde to interact with his own creations, revealing to the audience his inner conflicts, observations, and shifting moral reflections.

Choreographer: Annabelle Lopez Ochoa
Coproduction of Queensland Ballet, Hong Kong Ballet and Atlanta Ballet.
Premiere: 2023, Hong Kong Ballet.

This ballet explores the career and personal life of the legendary French designer. From her difficult childhood to her success in the fashion industry, her wartime controversies, and her enduring legacy. One of the most intriguing elements is the character of Shadow-Chanel, a spectral figure that guides and encourages the real Coco Chanel through her work. This figure may represent the inescapable weight of what her name and brand will become long after her time, for better or worse, reminding Chanel that her choices will shape her legacy forever. Through this Shadow character, Lopez Ochoa explores how history remembers visionaries—both for their brilliance and their complexities.