Infra

Infra at Covent Garden

Wayne McGregor's first big commission as resident

 choreographer of the Royal Ballet looks at what lies

 beneath the familiar face

Debra Craine

There was a lot riding on this ballet. Wayne McGregor's first big commission as resident choreographer of the Royal Ballet would prove if Monica Mason was right to give him the job, while his follow-up to the wildly successful Chroma (2006) would show if he had more than one Covent Garden hit up his sleeve. Even BBC Television was taking note, filming his every move for a documentary about the making of Infra.

So how clever that his new one-act ballet turned out so well. Infra (highlight of the Royal's latest triple bill) does everything McGregor needed to do at this stage of his career. It shows him moving on with his art, while taking on board what these wonderful dancers are about. His dance language, usually so hyperactive and hyperextended, so cerebral and cool, is here calmer and more passionate.

The first thing that strikes you about Infra is Julian Opie's set. His evocative figures, drawn in outline on a giant LED screen, move back and forth high across the stage, like busy London commuters. Underneath are the live dancers, the inner manifestation of the outer world above. Their memories, fears, dreams and desires are being lived out in the intimacy of their own heads. McGregor's movement may still be a full-body workout (undulating torsos, limbs constantly in motion, muscles yearning to exceed their limits) but it speaks as strongly of compassion and anger, of happiness and anxiety, tenderness and tears.

The music, a new score by the German composer Max Richter, is a melancholic minimalist wash. The choreography (yes, it's on pointe) comes mostly in small groupings - “landscape of miniatures” is how McGregor describes it. So it's a shock when the stage suddenly fills with people and there in the middle is stunning Lauren Cuthbertson, overwhelmed by loneliness, crying her eyes out. Have the figures on the screen come to life and invaded her privacy? Or is her obvious pain what's really going on under the skin of their impassive façade? As they did with Chroma, the Royal's outstanding dancers bring dramatic colouring to the piece, but even so, moments like this show how far McGregor has delved into the emotional potential of his impressive dance palette.

Infra will be shown on BBC Two on Sat at 7.10pm