A chaotic bill that is less than the sum of its parts

Dance Royal Ballet mixed bill Royal Opera House ★★★★★

The Royal Ballet’s latest mixed programme features something new, something classic and something retro from three stalwarts of British dance: Wayne Mcgregor’s Obsidian Tear (2016), an exploration of maleness; Frederick Ashton’s Marguerite and Armand, a one-act ballet created in 1963 as a star vehicle for Margot Fonteyn and Rudolf Nureyev; and Kenneth Macmillan’s 1977 ragtime romp Elite Syncopations.

Separately, all have garnered enormous praise but when viewed side by side they flatline, each appearing more archaic than the last. It feels chaotic, and not in a good way.

They represent important shifting points in dance history, but do absolutely nothing to complement each other. There’s no common thread, nor are they so sharply contrasted that they invigorate the palate.

Obsidian Tear is the saviour of the bill. It’s an ambiguous probe into the roles of gender in society that swings between extreme tenderness and extreme brutality. Calvin Richardson and Matthew Bell do an extraordinary job at bringing Mcgregor’s violently vulnerable choreography to life, and it’s a galvanising start.

Ashton’s tale of a woman who falls in love with a man whose father disapproves of their pairing is timeless and so should still resonate, but the interpretation, unchanged since the Sixties, feels flimsy and thin.

The exquisite Alessandra Ferri (still unbelievably supple at 54) portrays an agonisingly beautiful heroine. Her ability to execute technically flawless movement while navigating the character’s complexity is second to none. As her love interest, Federico Bonelli tries hard to keep up but next to Ferri he looks positively wooden.

And as for Elite Syncopations, its acid-bright costumes and overt rambunctiousness might have once been the life of the party but it has now definitely overstayed its welcome. This is a stark reminder that when it comes to curating a mixed programme, the whole should be very much greater than the sum of its parts. Until May 11. 020 7240 1200; roh.org.uk