The Royal Ballet 2025/26 - Ferdinand Hérold: La Fille mal gardée

Director: Frederick Ashton (coreographer)

Music: Ferdinand Hérold
Arranged and Orchestrated by John Lanchbery
Scenario: Jean Dauberval
Designer: Osbert Lancaster
Lighting Designer: John B. Read
Dancers: James Hay (Widow Simone), Francesca Hayward (Lise), Marcelino Sambé (Colas), Christopher Saunders (Thomas), Joshua Junker (Alain)

Lise is the only daughter of Widow Simone, the owner of a prosperous farm. She is in love with the young farmer Colas, but her mother has higher ambitions for her, hoping to marry her off to Alain, the son of the wealthy proprietor Thomas. Desperate to marry Colas rather than Alain, Lise contrives to outwit her mother’s plans.  

When La Fille mal gardée premiered in Covent Garden on 28 January 1960, it instantly won all hearts. Inspired by Jean Dauberval’s French ballet, Ashton’s version combines exuberant good humour and an affectionate portrayal of village life. The Royal Ballet’s Founder Choreographer, Ashton hoped to capture the ‘leafy pastoral of perpetual sunshine...the suspended stillness of a Constable landscape of my beloved Suffolk, luminous and calm’. Osbert Lancaster’s colourful designs bring the charm of the countryside to life.

Testament to Ashton’s boundless creative invention, the ballet is constructed like a brilliantly complex piece of clockwork with technically demanding choreography that stretches the world’s best dancers. Ashton made full use of the technical talents of his original cast – Nadia Nerina and David Blair – and this is reflected in the virtuosity of much of the ballet’s choreography: multiple pirouettes, grand lifts and fleet footwork. Highlights include the pas de ruban (ribbon dance), where Lise and Colas dance together, their bodies intertwined by a ribbon – a symbol of their tender love. In order to evoke the bliss of the rustic countryside, Ashton also included elements of national folk dance – from maypole dancing to a Lancashire clog dance for Widow Simone.

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Ticket information

Tickets are available at the Cassa of the Urania National Filmtheater and in the Ticket Sale System of Interticket.

Ticket price: 4900 HUF
Discounted tickets are available at the price of 4500 for those purchasing tickets for at least theree different performances for the season at the same time.

Please note that after the start of the screening, you can only take a seat on the floor side.

Thank you for your understanding!
Directorate of Uránia National Film Theater