Peaky Blinders – Birmingham Hippodrome

Ballet Rambert play a Peaky Blinder

Full Disclosure: I’ve never seen the TV show “Peaky Blinders”

Fuller Disclosure: After this stunning, definitive version I don’t want to.

With all the visceral violence of its leading characters, this ballet stomps into town, kicks open the door and makes itself at home before you can even say, “Come in.” It throws us against the wall, blows smoke in our face and threatens to rob us blind – and we love.

As any Brummie worth their pork scratchings will tell you, Stephen Knight’s TV show was wrought in the Midlands and forged in the land which once produced half the world’s consumption of iron products. The ballet starts with anvils and chains and literal sparks flying as our anti-heroes emerge battered, bruised and bewildered from the fetid trenches of the first world war and set themselves on a path of crime, corruption and scandalous capers.

It’s a show which not only closes the coffin lid on any remaining traces of effete ballet which may linger in the audience’s mind but slams it shut, nails it closed with rusty nails and safely ensures we’ll never think of ballet that way again.

Rambert Ballet have produced something truly outstanding which grips you by the collar studs from the off and holds your face to the narrative demanding your undivided attention as the plot twists, the dancers gyrate and the conflicts ensue. It is muscular and magnificent seeping testosterone from every orifice tempered with soft, delicate moments of contrasting repose.

Director/choreographer, Benoit Swan Pouffer moulds the material with such deft precision it’s impossible not to be totally compelled by the story and its presentation. The plot follows those naughty blinder boys as they muscle in on various businesses, over turn competitors and pretty much rule the Brummie roost. By Act Two our leading blinder, Thomas Shelby (awesomely danced by the brutally handsome, Guillaume Quéau), is beaten into moral trauma and turns to opium prompting a surreal yet elegant evocative of a drugs trip which is eerily enchanting.

The stunning band embellishes the whole with a thumping, throbbing score which, though loud, thankfully leaves us unharmed. The sound mix is so perfect it allows us to enjoy the urgent, passionate folksy-rock score without damaging our ears – a score which, judging from the whoops for recognition, features some familiar music from the show.

The diverse ensemble each gives us one, two sometimes three different characters all of whom we feel we know perfectly by the end. Naya Lovell, Seren Williams, Adél Bálint, Aishwarya Raut, Alex Soulliere, Angélique Blasco, Antonello Sangirardi, Archie White, Joseph Kudra, Caití Carpenter, Cali Hollister, Conoy Kerrigan, Dylan Tedaldi, Jonathan Wade, Max Day, Musa Motha, Simone Damberg Wurtz make up the company and each and everyone deserve a review of their own. One unified and united unit of dancers each holding their own and adding a complete and satisfying contribution to the whole. Benjamin Zephaniah’s distinctive Brummie tones as the narrator completes the package.

If you’ve have ever shrugged indifferently at the suggestion or offer of a ballet ticket, shrug no more. This blasts ballet well into the next century while telling a story from the last.

Playing until 27th May, https://www.birminghamhippodrome.com/calendar/peaky-blinders-the-redemptio/

Reviewer: Peter Kinnock

Reviewed: 23rd May 2023

North West End UK Rating: