Creature

In a dilapidated former Arctic research station, the Creature has been conscripted by a military brigade into a bold new experimental programme. He is being tested for his mental and physical ability to adapt to extreme cold, isolation and homesickness; vital qualities in mankind’s proposed colonisation of the final frontiers, on earth and beyond. In humanity’s fight for survival, who will be left behind?

In Creature, choreographer Akram Khan immerses us in a future that is closer than we think, revealing an unearthly tale of exploitation and abandonment. His hypnotic choreography sees dancers glitching, flowing and marching to a compulsive score by Vincenzo Lamagna, which blends electronic sounds, speech and a live orchestra.

Inspired by Georg Büchner’s expressionist classic Woyzeck, with shadows of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Creature is a unique dance experience – visceral, absorbing, and earth-shaking.

Following the pivotal impact of Dust and Giselle, Creature is Akram Khan’s third collaboration with English National Ballet. The brilliant creative team is completed by Academy Award-winning designer Tim Yip, lighting designer Michael Hulls and dramaturg Ruth Little.

Superb… A tight-wound drama that never lets up. [Khan] piles up themes and imagery into a monumental whole.

★★★★★ The Independent

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A co-production between English National Ballet and Opera Ballet Vlaanderen (OBV)
Co-producers; Sadler’s Wells, London

Main Image: Dancer: Jeffrey Cirio. Photo © Jason Bell. Creative Direction: Charlotte Wilkinson

This performance contains flashing lights, loud music, haze effects, themes of suicide and death, and depictions of sexual violence and abuse.