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14 April 2008
Church of Scotland Hall, London WC2

Robin Key, Chairman of the London Ballet Circle, warmly welcomed Thomas Whitehead and thanked him for agreeing to give a talk in one of the busiest seasons for anyone performing.  Robin began by asking Tom about his role as Tybalt, in the Royal Ballet’s production of Romeo and Juliet, which many members had enjoyed and for which he had received wonderful critical comment.

TW:When I came back into the company this season I was down to cover Tybalt – I think for the first time. If things had gone according to plan, I would have been performing it in May (2008) but it happened that for the first run of shows in November 2007 the casting was changed because of injuries to so many principals at that time.  It was going to be my good friend Rupert (Pennefather) who was going to do Tybalt but because he went on as Romeo, I got to do Tybalt which I was thrilled about.   

RK: Tell us about learning the role of Tybalt.

TW:I had a very short period to learn it – just two or three weeks. 

RK:  Who did you work with?

TW:  I worked with Chris Saunders mostly. 

At that time I was staying with Rupert so we would practice the sword-fighting of an evening with some sticks that we found in the garden!  We wanted it to be very realistic but it got too realistic at one point.  I got a cut on my eye in a rehearsal one day but you do have to push things so you can see how far you can go with it!

RK:  You enjoyed performing it?

TW:  I had a great time performing it and I had some really great feedback from it.

RK:  We normally think of you as Paris.  Do you enjoy that role too?

TW:  I enjoy Tybalt more now.  I’d done Paris for a long time and there’s not a lot one can do with that role.  I found it a more difficult role than Tybalt because Paris is so passive – there’s not a lot of emotion there but with Tybalt you can go for it a bit more.

RK:  I think you bring out the coolness of Paris very well which is important.  Tell us about some of your other roles.  For example, you were in La Bayadère.

TW:  This season has involved a lot of roles I have already done.  Solor’s Friend in La Bayadère I had done before and it was the first role I did when I returned to the company.  It was a bit of a challenge for me suddenly to be back after a year away dancing in bare feet and in a different style.  It was difficult at the beginning of the season to put the white tights back on.

RK:  Did you enjoy Jewels?

TW:  Again it was really challenging for me but I did enjoy it.  It was quite special to be a part of those performances.

RK:  What has been the highlight of the season so far?

TW:  Tybalt was probably the highlight of the season so far.

RK:  Rite of Spring must have been hard work.

TW:  Rite of Spring is fabulous – I love it.  Again, it was something I had done before but it’s just such a great piece.  Mentally, it is very challenging as you have to concentrate and focus.  It’s also a great work out! 

RK:  You had a leave of absence from the Royal Ballet for a year to work with Matthew Bourne and lead in Swan Lake.  How did you come to work with Matt?  Tell us about Monica Mason’s reaction too.

TW:  It all came from me.  There was a friend of mine in the company whose girlfriend at the time had danced with Matthew Bourne’s Swan Lake for a number of years. I had known people who had done the lead Swan – people like JoséTirado - and I’d always really wanted to do it since I saw Adam (Cooper) do it right in the beginning as I think it is such an iconic role for a man.  So when I became aware through Henry (St Clair) that Matthew was casting, it felt like this was the right time to do it so I wrote to Matthew and sent him my resume and photograph.  There was an audition in the summer (of 2006) when the Royal Ballet season had finished.  I had never met Matt until that point.  There was no special treatment for me – it was an open audition and he was casting the show from top to bottom.

RK:  Was that quite nerve-racking?

TW:  It was fairly nerve-racking because I’m not used to auditioning but I knew the show so well I knew the movement a little bit and I knew I would feel comfortable with it.  I trained as an all-rounder – not just in classical ballet but also in contemporary and jazz - so I knew I would be able to get into that style. 

We had the audition and Matt chatted to me then there was a call back in the afternoon and he asked me what the situation would be if he offered it to me.  I had to be very honest with him and tell him that Monica didn’t know I was there.  I said I didn’t know what the situation would be so I would have to find out.  I said I would really like to do it and would do everything in my power to make it happen so he offered it to me – which was great.

Then I had to track down Monica.  She was in Austria at the Bregenz Festival and I managed to track her down to her hotel room.  She said ‘I think that’s wonderful.’  Straightaway, she thought it was great.  She said ‘Give me a few days just to look into it and see logistically if we can release you and see what it is going to mean for the company.’  She was very true to her word and three days later she called me back and said ‘Yes, that’s fine, you go for it and we will keep your place and we wish you all the luck.’

Fortunately for everybody, it worked out that I could do the first bill of the (2006-7) season which was Voluntaries and Sinfonietta.  I knew Sinfonietta and had done it before and loved it.  I had never done Voluntaries nor any of Glen Tetley’s work but and I really liked it and was thrilled to be involved. 

My first day of rehearsal for Swan Lake co-incided with my last performance of Sinfonietta so it was a very smooth overlap but it was an emotional night, even though I knew I wasn’t leaving completely.  I even fell over on stage in that performance which I had never done before.

RK:  There’s a famous saying about that, isn’t there?

TW:  Yes but I didn’t know it until Monica said ‘It means you’re coming back!’ 

RK:  What did you do in the audition for Matt Bourne? 

TW: It was material from the show.  Everybody was doing the same material.  We did the section called ‘Flocking’ which is in the white act with the guys all dancing together and we did some of the Ballroom scene as well. 

It was fairly clear early on in the audition that I was probably the only one trying out for the lead.  I wasn’t relaxed. I didn’t think I was going to walk it - I was a nobody as far as they were concerned. 

RK:  So you went straight into rehearsals?

TW:  Yes, we were rehearsing at Three Mills in Bromley-by-Bow.  I really wanted to make it good so I was absolutely fully committed from the first day.  I was rehearsing all day and would go back home in the evening to watch the video to make sure I knew what I was doing the next day.  From day one until the last performance it was all I thought about – to a certain detriment - but it was necessary for my artistic fulfilment. 

RK:  How did class work at New Adventures?  How was it structured?

TW:  They have very varied classes because everybody is from such different backgrounds and training. The very first class was a contemporary class then a ballet class then, when we were on tour, some days we would have a yoga class.

I remember the very first day.  I was shy and nervous and didn’t really know anybody.  I was in the very first class and I had put on my ballet shoes.  I was looking around and noticed that everyone else was in bare feet or socks so I moved to the back and took my shoes off and tried to look as if I knew what I was doing! 

RK:  Who would lead those classes?

TW:  The first class was led, I think, by our touring director Vicky Evans.  Etta Murfitt took some classes early on.  There were two Dance Captains on the tour who would take ballet class.  Every city that we went to we would get guest teachers.

RK:  How long were you rehearsing before the first performance?

TW:  We did a month.

RK:  You have already indicated that it was an intense month but did you enjoy it? 

TW:  Yes, I particularly like the rehearsal process.  I really like being in the studio and I am happiest when I have to wring my t-shirt out at the end and it hurts to walk home!  That’s when I feel I’m doing what I do best.  I know it sounds strange but it is very unsatisfying when you leave and you still feel fresh after a day’s work. 

RK:  Take us to opening night.

TW:  The first venue was Paris.  I didn’t open there as I was sharing the role with Alan (Vincent) who had danced it before and who taught me most of it, alongside Matthew and Scott (Ambler).  Alan opened the tour in Paris and then the next night was my night and it was nerve-racking and it never stopped being nerve-racking. 

Coming from the Royal Ballet where we do so many different performances throughout a season, people used to ask me what it felt like to do the same show night after night.  I had reservations about that aspect as well and wondered how the people in West End shows kept going.  But it was a very valuable lesson to me because I learnt it was such a big role that there was always something to work on – an adjustment or even a different approach. 

At the beginning of the tour I was preparing as if I was preparing for any Royal Ballet performance - doing double tours and those kinds of things – but I realised quite quickly that this was not the way to prepare for SwanLake because it is such a different style.  I had to get warm, get the blood flowing and get a little bit psyched  then stop and breathe and slow everything down because in the first entrance you go in and stand on one leg and you can’t do that if you are all frantic. 

RK:  Was there a concern about the reaction of the Parisian audiences?

TW:  Not for me because I was blissfully ignorant about what had gone before. But later I did hear stories about the Parisian audience – people standing up and saying ‘This is not ballet’ then walking out but I never saw it. 

RK:  You were then in London at Sadler’s Wells.

TW:  It was really thrilling for me to open at Sadler’s Wells.  It was very special to me as I had been hoping I would get that opportunity.  It was great and we got really nice reviews. 

RK:  A great venue, a very supportive audience and great reviews.

TW:  And it’s one of my favourite theatres. 

RK:  How did you find working with New Adventures?  Was it very different from being with the Royal Ballet?

TW:  Yes, very different indeed.  The Opera House is the most wonderful venue.  Having gone away from the Royal Ballet then going back, one appreciates it more – just how wonderful the shows are and how beautiful it all is. But it is a connoisseur’s house for people who know what they are looking at. 

The SwanLake show is more about entertainment and I found that very refreshing.  The emphasis is not on the legs and the feet – it’s about the performance.  Nevertheless, I was very aware I was not only representing Matthew Bourne but that I was also representing the Royal Ballet and myself.  I am accustomed to working in a high pressure environment at the Opera House and approached SwanLake in the same way as I would a performance for the Royal Ballet.  I wanted to stay true to my classical technique and line but also get the style right and make the performance interesting and entertaining. 

RK:  What were some of the highlight destinations on the tour?

TW: The tour was good because although I had been to all the cities before and almost all of the venues, it was nice to go back having done all the sight-seeing the first time around and just go back and relax into it a bit more, enjoy it more and soak it up a little bit more.  We had three months in Australia which was fantastic. 

Audience reactions were very different from city to city.  Sydney was great.  We were there during their Gay Pride week andSwanLake has quite a large gay audience so it was packed every night and there was whooping in the aisles!  As we were doing the performances in Korea we were thinking that they didn’t like it.  There was no noise – not a peep – no applause where you expected it.  Then at the end it was like a rock concert - they just erupted – it was amazing. 

The most special place was to take it to Moscow, it being the birthplace of SwanLake.  That was nervy because we wondered just how it would go down but the Russians adored it.  They loved it and it got good reviews.  Some of the Bolshoi dancers came and they all really liked it and they all wanted to see us afterwards and talk about it. 

Matt was very true to the score and found things in the score for that production that probably make even more sense than the classical version.  The Russians are such an educated audience too.  They giggled at times because they know the score so well that they expect to see certain things, so when you replace it with, say, a Soho bar, you get laughter.    They were completely enthralled by it.

RK:  I guess you would like to work with Matt Bourne again?

TW:  I would indeed. 

RK:  Looking back on the decision to take a year out of the Royal Ballet, do you feel it was a very positive year?  Was it difficult to go back into the Royal Ballet?

TW:  I learnt a lot and I wouldn’t have changed it for the world.  It was definitely the right thing to do at exactly the right time.  I learnt a lot about myself; about leading a company and about leading a show and about that level of responsibility.  From day one of the rehearsal to the last performance it was absolutely my focus.  In the second half of the tour I was doing five shows a week and it is not an easy show, so as soon as the curtain came down I was already thinking about the next performance and thinking about recovery.  It taught me a lot about my own reserves and how to look after myself. 

It is a very close and friendly company and, because of my role, I was working more with the directors and the management so I also got a little insight into how companies are run and it gave me a new-found respect for Monica and the way she is as a director.  It is so easy for dancers to complain about decisions, castings and scheduling but as a younger dancer you don’t understand that it is not so straightforward and that you have to realise that everybody is up against it.  The important thing is that everybody pulls in the same direction and it has all got to be about the performance. 

There was a time early on in the SwanLake tour where I thought I wasn’t going to go back to the Royal Ballet.  I had had a taste of being out in the world after having been in the Royal Ballet since 1994.  Then, as the tour went on, I felt I had learnt a lot and matured and improved as an artist and that I really wanted to bring that back to the Main Stage of the Opera House.

RK:  It must have been great to go back and to be so busy.

TW:   Yes and it was nice when people like David Drew said ‘You look 100% more comfortable on stage.  You have an air of authority that you didn’t have before.’  It’s really good to hear things like that.

RK:  Take us back to the beginning – how did you get into ballet?

TW:  There are two stories about how I got into ballet.  I was a hyperactive child who liked dressing up and listening to music and dancing around to Michael Jackson and Shakin’ Stevens.  That’s the more romantic story.  But the other story is that I was a very sickly child and was always in hospital.  I had lots of allergies and very bad asthma – I used to have to take inhalers and sleep with a vaporiser by my bed.  And I was always very slight. 

I had never excelled at sports - probably because of my illnesses and weaknesses - I would sneeze every time I got onto a football pitch!   So my doctor suggested I take some dance classes instead.  I started taking dance classes but I didn’t last very long.  I think the classes were on a Thursday.  I had been a Cub and then I got into Scouts but I had to give it up to take my dance classes.  Then on the night of my dance class there was this programme on TV I really wanted to watch – Street Hawk or whatever it was - obviously the dancing hadn’t really grabbed me at that stage!  Then I don’t really know why I got back into it but I went to a different school and started doing modern dance then tap then my teacher said I should try ballet so I tried ballet then after a while I was what my teacher called a ‘full-time’ student.  There were five or six of us who went every day after school – while my mum did my homework and my dad waited in the car!  I went every night.  I started when I was about nine or ten and I think I was 13 when I really made a career choice and decided that this was what I was going to do. 

RK:  What did that mean in terms of education?

TW:  I was never particularly academic and I never really enjoyed school.  It was difficult doing what I did at that time.  I think it is probably easier now for boys to do ballet classes – I hope so – but at that time it was difficult because there was a very large stigma attached to it.  Although I didn’t really get on at school I knew I needed to get it out of the way so I completed my GSCEs at 16 then auditioned for a number of schools and was accepted into two:  one was ArtsEducationalSchool in Chiswick and the other was the RoyalBalletSchool.  I chose the ArtsEducationalSchool because I wanted to be an entertainer – an all rounder – I wanted to be Cosmo Brown (from Singin’ in the Rain) or Danny Kaye or someone like that. 

A year later I was at the Yorkshire Ballet Seminars when Donald MacLeary asked if I would like to join the RoyalBalletSchool.  I said I didn’t know how the School would feel about me since I had turned down a place there the previous year but he said it would be fine, so I figured you didn’t get asked twice for no reason and that maybe it was time to specialise.  At the ArtsEducationalSchool there were only about four boys and I was the best so I needed that extra level of competition but it was shocking at first going into the RoyalBalletSchool and to be the worst!  However, it was necessary in order to achieve.

RK:  How did you get on in those first couple months at the RoyalBalletSchool?

TW:  The first thing that struck me was that all the guys who had come out of White Lodge were talking about their new-found freedom being in London.  I had been in London for a year while at Arts Educational and had gone a little bit crazy and so I felt like I had gone to prison at the RoyalBalletSchool!  However, I soon knuckled down and got into it and everyone was always really nice.  But I do remember the first day - we were divided up into the ‘White Lodgers’ and ‘The Outsiders’ and that kind of stays with you throughout.  White Lodge is a real club for all those who have been through the whole system from 11 years old – I’ll never get my full membership!

RK:  How did it finally come about that you joined the Royal Ballet?

TW:  I did my two years at the RoyalBalletSchool and then auditioned for Northern Ballet Theatre, where I had done my work experience, and the English National Ballet where I was offered a place on the spot.  I’ve always felt that my audition for the English National Ballet was my audition for the Royal Ballet as well.  As far as I knew at the time there was no interest from the Royal Ballet until I got offered a job with the English National Ballet when suddenly they offered me a contract too.  Then I was wondering what to do and a school secretary asked me ‘Do you want to be a big fish in a small pond or a small fish in a big pond and try to become a big fish?’ That seemed much more of a challenge.

RK:  What was it like joining the company?  Was it different from what you had expected?  Had you had a good insight as to what it would be like?

TW:  I had no idea what it would be like.  At that time we were all at Barons Court and the company was rehearsing there as well so as a student you could see the company and got to know the company a little bit - although they never spoke to you - but you could watch their classes and you could look up to everybody. 

In my first year in the company I don’t think I spoke to anybody – I just kept my head down and worked and waited until I was spoken to.  I think it is a very difficult company to join.  It is a very serious company and it is a very strong company.  There is a kind of initiation process almost that you have to go through and I really disliked some of those older guys when I first joined.  Now I find myself being one of those older guys and I am sure that there are some younger boys there who don’t like me! 

RK:  Let’s talk about choreographers.  You have been quite widely quoted on how much you enjoyed being Don José in Mats Ek’s Carmen.  Tell us why you liked it and what it was like working with Mats.

TW:  I had heard of Mats but I didn’t know his work so when I knew he was coming to the Opera House I got the video of Carmen because we were going to have an open audition.  Rupert and I watched it together and we both said ‘I hope I’m not that guy who has to do all that running at the end!’  We had the audition the next day and it was amazing – it was the full company.  There was Jonny Cope and Johan Kobborg – everybody down to little old me.  I did the audition and then had to wait until the casting went up on the board and my name went up.  Obviously I was thrilled.  It was my first big principal role and originally I was dancing with Darcey (Bussell) but they discovered fairly quickly that it didn’t really suit her so Tamara (Rojo) was brought in and it was very much her thing.  I have always adored Tamara so that was another bonus and Mats was great too.  I think the man is a genius – he’s a fantastically smart man.  In our recent mid-season break I went over to New York where there is a yearly event called ‘Fall for Dance’ and Mats and his wife, Ana Laguna, were dancing in it.  He was incredible and it was brilliant. 

RK:  How much time was he able to give Carmen?

TW:  He was there probably about a month.  My only regret was that he never saw us perform.  He saw the first night, which was Sylvie (Guillem) and Massimo (Murru), and then he left.   

RK:  We very much associate you with work in the Clore Studio and the Linbury Theatre and you have worked there a lot with Wayne McGregor.  Clearly you have found him an important influence on your career.

TW:  Yes, I have.  I always used to do a lot of work in the Clore and the Linbury and was lucky enough to be involved when Wayne first arrived and made Symbiont(s).  It was great.  We were working alongside Random Dance Company in Brainstate which we took to Washington as part of the tour and that was another new style for me.  At that point I had already realised that my leaning was more towards the modern work.  I had never been the most classical dancer in the Royal Ballet – quite possible its least classical dancer! – so I would always grab the chance to work with Wayne.

I think the appointment of Wayne as the Resident Choreographer is wonderful – I think it’s great.  That happened while I was away last year and I thought it was a very good move by Monica to appoint him. 

I would love to work with him again but I am realistic enough to know that I might have already had my time with him.  The dancers he uses now are different to the way I dance.  He likes the high legs and the sharp lines.  Back in the days when he was in the Clore it was closer to what he was doing with Random Dance Company – a little bit more contemporary and more modern.  Now he is working much more with classical dancers.

RK:  You mentioned that you are also working on the new Kim Brandstrup piece ‘Rushes – fragments of a lost story’.

TW:  Yes, that’s what I am doing now.  Throughout my career my chances to shine in the Opera House and the Royal Ballet have all come in modern works by people like Nacho Duato, Mats Ek and Wayne. 

About a month ago I was asked to spend an hour in a studio with Kim and I knew that had been happening with a lot of people as I had seen name calls going up and a bunch of people going in.  Then a girl and I were called into the Clore and we had an hour with Kim and that was it - I didn’t hear anything else.  Her name went up and she was in rehearsals so I figured I had missed out.  Then my name went up on the board too and I thought it must be a typo - Acosta/Whitehead – I thought ‘That can’t be right!’  But it was.

Originally Kim wanted to choreograph two completely different pieces for Carlos and his girls and me and my girls but I think it was decided quite early on that this might be too difficult and very unfair on the covers.  He was working in the studio a lot with Carlos and Alina (Cojocaru) structuring almost all the material and putting it together. 

From the very beginning I said to Kim that I couldn’t believe I was second cast to Carlos.  I said ‘I’m never going to look like Carlos!’  He said ‘It’s OK, I haven’t got you because I want you to look like Carlos.  I’ve got you because you are you and it’s about the dynamic you are going to create with these females.’  It was the emotion and the characterisation he was looking for. 

In fact it was only today that, for the first time, I saw Carlos on stage dancing with his girls.  Throughout that whole period Kim would not let us go in to their full calls.  He would always keep us separate.  So the choreography has come from the same place but it has evolved in a completely different way.  It is not two different ballets but I couldn’t get up and do it with his girls – it is that different.  It’s really nice that we have been allowed to make it our own and own it for ourselves.

RK:  We are looking forward to seeing it enormously.  Tell us about what other ambitions you have in the arts world, in particular, in acting.

TW:  It might be a pipe dream, I don’t know, but acting has always been something I have been interested in.  I have been having voice coaching lessons and acting lessons but they have been put on hold for a while now.

When we were in Moscow performing at the Moscow Arts Theatre as part of the Chekhov International Festival, all the Chekhov players would come to watch us every night and they just loved it.  In fact the Director of the Moscow Arts Theatre actually invited me back to perform there doing Shakespeare.  I said ‘I’m not an actor, I’m a dancer’ and she said ‘No, you are an actor’ so I thought ‘Well, if she says so, then I am. Who am I to argue?!’ 

A member then congratulated Tom on his performances on 1st and 2nd April 2008 in the Draft Works programme where he and Sian Murphy had performed Solace choreographed by Erico Montes.

TW:  I think it is great to use spaces like the Clore Studio for things like Draft Works but I always felt that those programmes were for the younger dancers; people who are not doing so much and want to get seen and cast.  The Royal Ballet is such a big company that it has boys with amazing talent just standing at the back holding spears!  But these guys want to dance and the Draft Works type events, I felt, were for people like them and that I had had my day doing that type of work.  But Erico approached me and asked me if I would be in his piece.  Sian and I are very close and I knew she was going to do it but I was so surprised that he had asked me too.  Those younger guys aren’t immediately going to come to someone like me – they go to their peers.  So I figured that he had asked me for a very good reason.  As an artist, as a dancer, I thought that he must have seen something in me that he wanted to draw on and bring out and so I agreed to do it.  I think he made a really nice piece and I was really happy to perform it.  It was short and sweet and wasn’t too difficult and it seemed to go down quite well. 

Members agreed and hoped there might be another opportunity to see Solace.

A member then asked Tom about his recent roles in Different Drummer, and specifically about that of the Soldier who wore a crown of thorns.  Why had he been carrying a severed head?!

TW:   I have no idea.  I wish I could tell you - it was a little bit mysterious to me as well!

The role is called the Jesus Christ Soldier – at least that’s what it said in my shoes!  I am not really familiar with the story of Woyzeck so I don’t really know how the thing with the severed head came about.

RK:  Did you enjoy that piece?

TW:  Yes, it was great.  There was a lovely little pas de deux and it’s a featured role and I had fun doing it. 

Tom was then asked what other roles he was preparing.

TW:  Hopefully I can do Tybalt again when Romeo and Juliet comes around again.  We are at that stage of the season where we are winding up for the tour.  I am doing the Gaoler in Manon which I have done before and is another favourite role of mine.  I really enjoy doing the demi-character roles.  They are principal roles without the pressure on the dancing so the acting can come through.

RK:  Looking ahead, what are your other ambitions in the Royal Ballet?  Would you like to do more roles where your characterisation can come out?

TW:  Yes, absolutely.  I would really like to do Carmen again but I know that there are no guarantees that I will.  Mats is coming back, I think around October, to do the same process again which is absolutely understandable as its six years since we last did Carmen – so I’m praying for that. 

I am still hungry to explore further my abilities.  It would be great to work with Matthew Bourne again and I really like coaching too.  That was something else I realised about myself during my year out.  It made me realise the skill set I had acquired over the years and the knowledge of dance and theatre that I have now.  It was only by going out for a year and finding other people drawing on that knowledge that I began to realise its value. I like helping dancers and I think I have a very good eye.  I am not particularly interested in being a ballet teacher but being a coach is definitely part of my ambition as well. 

On behalf of the members, the Chairman thanked Tom for taking time out of his busy schedule to talk and for his numerous performances which members had enjoyed so much and then he closed the meeting by wishing Tom every success in the future.