Sir Matthew Christopher Bourne (born 13 January 1960) is a British choreographer. His productions contain many classic cinema and popular culture references and draw thematic inspiration from musicals, film noir and popular culture
Popular novels and films usually form the basis for his work but Bourne's sui generis distinguishes his dance adaptations from their originals. For example, his 1995 restaging of Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake updated the ballet's setting, narrative and famously used all-male swans.
Workshops, collaboration and the innevitable dialogue with the original works inform many of his adaption's choreographical routines and thematic concepts. For his 1997 reimagining of Cinderella, Bourne invoked the Victorian and Edwardian eras by disseminating certain books and novels from those time periods amongst the production's cast members.
His New Adventures dance company's work covers ballet, contemporary dance, dance theatre and musical theatre.
His adaptations of Sleeping Beauty, Edward Scissorhands, The Red Shoes, Dorian Gray, and Lord of the Flies added new dimensions to these near-ubiquitous stories. Bourne's recent work, The Midnight Bell, sets Patrick Hamilton's 1929 novel in a pub, and Bourne's Romeo and Juliet put the tragedy's mental health and youth suicide themes centre stage.
In 2016, he was knighted as part of Queen Elizabeth II 2016 New Year Honours list for 'Services to Dance'.
Early life and influences
Bourne was born on January 13, 1960, in Hackney, London, England. His mother was a secretary and his father worked for Thames Water. Bourne had no formal ballet training during his childhood. However, as a teenager, he was passionate about show business. He would frequently autograph hunt in London's West End after his mother took him to see Dame Edith Evans and Friends in 1974 at the Theatre Royal Haymarket. He wrote to and received letters back from Joan Crawford, Charlie Chaplain and Bette Davies. He was eighteen when he attended Sadler's Wells Theatre to see his first ballet, Swan Lake.
He worked as a filing clerk at the BBC and as an usher at The National Theatre for four years after graduating from William Fitt and Sir George Monoux School in Walthamstow, London. At 20 he started studying at London's Laban Centre and began dance classes at 22. In 1985, he toured for two years with the centre's dance company. However, his interests gradually shifted from dancing to choreographing for television, theatre, and other dance companies. He completed a BA honours degree in contemporary dance in 1985. And in 1986, he graduated with an MA in dance performance. He co-founded the London-based company Adventures in Motion Pictures (AMP) in 1987. Bourne's radical reinterpretations of classic ballets set him apart as a choreographer. In 1992, he placed the Christmas Eve scene of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's The Nutcracker in a Victorian orphanage reminiscent of a Charles Dickens novel. His 1994 version of Filippo Taglioni's La Sylphide titled Highland Fling, was set in a modern-day Glaswegien housing project. Highland Fling was also the beginning of Bourne's creative alliance with the designer Lez Brotherston.
Style and process
Bourne's work primarily concerns clarity of exposition, characterisation, technical staging and cinematic devices. Thematically, his work draws on Metro-Goldwyn Mayer musicals, film noir and Alfred Hitchcock, among others. Bourne's career trajectory shifted after his time at the Laban Centre, where he honed his signature theatrical style. His work stood in contrast to the more provocative dance styles of the 1980s, associated with artists such as Michael Clark and Lloyd Newson's DV8 Physical Theatre. Instead, Bourne's style centred on romance, wit, and tangible drama, as demonstrated in his adaptation of Swan Lake.
Bourne's New Adventure's troupe consists of both ballet and modern dancers who perform intricate choreography that stems from the character's actions and movements.
Bourne's works often convert written works into physical, visual, and musical forms, initiating a dialogue between the adaptation and the original work by actively emphasising the relationship between the two. Moreover, because his work uses many classic cinema and popular culture references, its impact largely depends on the viewer's relationship to the original work.