The Ballet Víctor Ullate Comunidad de Madrid includes in its repertoire a new version of one of the best known and most performed large-scale ballet productions. Respecting the original music, Eduardo Lao has undertaken the challenge of adapting Coppélia to a versatile cast of 22 dancers and imbuing it with his personal vision. To do so, he has brought out its comical nature, transforming Dr. Coppelius’ doll workshop into a cybernetic laboratory specialised in robotics and artificial intelligence, where research is being carried out to create an android of completely female appearance, behaviour and movements.
As George Balanchine said, “if Giselle is the grandest and most tragic ballet of the classical repertoire, Coppélia may be the greatest comedy”. The staging of this ballet is an opportunity for the Ballet Víctor Ullate Comunidad de Madrid to deploy, once again, their technical and artistic capabilities, combining different styles and updating one of most emblematic and popular pieces of the history of dance.

Víctor Ullate (Zaragoza, 1947), dancer, choreographer and pedagogue, was part of Antonio Ruiz Soler’s company from 1961 to 1965.  From 1966 and for the next fourteen years, he was part of Maurice Béjart’s legendary Ballet of the 20th Century. In 1979 he created and directed the classical ballet company integrated within the Ballet Nacional de España. In 1983, he created his own school, which would eventually give way to the Ballet Víctor Ullate in 1988 and the Fundación para la Danza Víctor Ullate in 2000. He has been awarded the National Dance Award and the Gold Beaux Arts Medal in 1989 and the Honorary Max Theatre Award 2008.

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