Lauren Cuthbertson 2025

Lauren Cuthbertson

Principal, The Royal Ballet

Interviewed by David Bain
American International Church, Tue 12th May, 2025

As Lauren had requested specific questions from David, he began by asking her (and the audience) what she had in common with Sylvie Guillem, Irek Mukhamedov and Carlos Acosta, apart from brilliance. The audience were stumped, but Lauren worked out that it was that she is now, and they were Principal Guest Artists of the Royal Ballet. She is the second British Principal Guest Artist after Darcy Bussell.

David moved on to the second question and told the audience that in the middle of his last interview with Laura Morera, she told him to ask her a question. Afterwards, she admitted that Lauren had told her to say that although Lauren, herself, cannot remember giving that advice. The question was why the change to Principal Guest Artist? Lauren replied that she felt that she was coming to a place in her career where she realised that contrary to what most people had told her, a ballet career is not very short and that one should put more emphasis on thinking about how to sustain it and keep it varied. You should consider how to carve your own path as you change and mature. For her, it was time to open a new chapter.

The idea of Principal Guest Artist came from Kevin O’Hare after a very frank and honest conversation with him. She was quite excited to consider what came next after ballet and unlike many people, she did not see the word ‘transition’ as negative and meaning that she was falling out of love with ballet. She simply lives in the real world where she is the mother of two children, and they are now the epicentre of her life. However, she could not love dancing any more than she does and she is passionate about the next generation of dancers, too. She felt that she still had much to offer and was as inspired and motivated as ever, but she needed time to develop some new skills and that meant that she could not dance full time anymore. She also did not want to end her career constantly saying that this would be her last performance of ‘xxx’ but rather wanted to keep moving forwards. Kevin really listened to her and then came back with the suggestion of Principal Guest Artist where she could commit per production (as opposed to per season) and allowed her to make her selections in a way that suited her as she is now: a woman, dancer and mother.

Lauren is now doing the Teacher’s Diploma at the Royal Ballet School. One of her dreams is to be an Artistic Director within the next 5-15 years and she was not sure where to focus initially. She recognised that nowadays, being a principal dancer is not enough, and one needs many additional skills to qualify for the job. Her idea is to create a pathway which will become her own personal “university” and prepare her for the role. The Teacher’s Diploma is step one on that pathway and may be followed by leadership training and then coaching. The important thing is to keep learning new things. This happens in the studio anyway, but most of the learning is repetitive as opposed to really new learning. Now she has the appetite to be in a new situation of brand-new learning. It is a 2-year course with six modules which are presented in a random order. She is almost through the first year. It takes place every Friday, so it is quite a commitment and there was a time last term where she could not attend every class because of scheduling clashes. The course was set up by Karen Berry with Mark Annear and the teacher who heads it is Sarah Daultry. It is partly lecture-based with quite a bit of essay writing, and partly practical, learning the foundations of classical ballet. This had made Lauren realise that her knowledge of ballet was super-focused on a miniscule percentage of the dance industry. The course takes her back to the beginnings of ballet, the various teaching practices and focuses on the learning styles and how to use them to teach and nurture different people.

The practical involves knowledge of musical queuing and learning to set exercises that get the most out of particular steps, so that you learn how to illustrate to the accompanying pianist the tempo and rhythm you require as you count the dancers in. This keeps the class varied. There are also modules on the healthy dancer which include anatomy and eating and also sections on safeguarding. Also interesting are the discussions within the cohorts on topics like early specialisation and whether that is a good or bad thing. As the cohorts come from varied backgrounds with different skillsets, this makes for dynamic discussions. Lauren has not planned the next stage of her personal “university” yet, but it will probably involve another course and/or shadowing and work experience.

David referred to an earlier conversation with Francesca Hayward who had said, in an interview with the Press, that she would be a future director of the Royal Ballet. Lauren suggested that that they may become co-Directors. She is just excited to be on this new path and, who knows, she may be satisfied simply joining the Parent-Teachers’ Association of her daughters’ school or baking bread for the local church.

Asked about motherhood and the challenge of bringing up her two daughters whilst having a career, Lauren said that she always knew that she wanted to continue to dance after having her children. Sometimes she feels torn, but she has a wonderful nanny, who is her “wing woman” and shares the mothering duties. She is also supported by her boyfriend, Matty. She didn’t have a lot to say on the subject except that she loves her daughters so much.

David remarked on the fact that many people say that dancers who come back after having children come back as different, stronger dancers. Lauren feels that maybe she is a different and stronger person which may be the result of having the children. She feels more confident in decision-making and more individual, following her own intuition. Also, as she said previously, she is no longer the centre of her own universe, and neither is her ballet career. Her life revolves around “the girls”. This takes the career pressure off her and she can channel her ambition with more clarity. Her daughters are Peggy (4) and Dolly (2). Peggy will start school in September. Although they both love dancing, they also love lots of other activities such as building, gymnastics, football and music so it is not obvious that they will take after their mother and become dancers. They are very active, and Peggy is quite a performer; very theatrical.

A while ago, Lauren participated in an episode of “Great Lives” on Radio 4 with Matthew Parris. She was contacted and asked to participate and to choose somebody. She chose Margot Fonteyn who was someone she wanted to know more about. After the show, she felt that there was still a great deal that she did not know or understand about her and maybe never will. Lauren grew up in Devon and at 8 years old she had been enthusiastically doing ballet for a while. She had no idea what a ballerina was or what they did but was simply captivated by dancing. One day, at an antique fair at the local town hall, she found a biography of Margot Fonteyn. The picture on the front cover was of Margot wearing an ’Ondine’ costume with a beautiful tiara. On seeing this picture, Lauren said to her mother, “Wow, mummy. I want to do that! Can I do that?” So, her mother bought the book for her and Margot became her first reference point, enlightening her as to what a ballerina was. Lauren was naturally curious about Margot’s life. She visited Panama and could not understand how the iconic role model that she and many others had looked up to, finished her life in such a way. She needed to know how and why it happened like this. She worked with two experts whom she met on the day and she was able to ask them what they knew so she could piece elements of Margot’s life together.

The discussion moved on to how Lauren decided which roles to take in her new position as Principal Guest Artist and it was as simple as taking on only new roles in order to keep things fresh. This is a feeling she has always had in her career, and she wanted to continue this. At the age of 40, she is now on her fourth debut of the season which is quite challenging but has been meaningful, motivating, fulfilling and tremendous fun. She has put a great deal into the roles and, in return, has got a great deal out of them.

Her last debut was in ‘Two of Us’, part of the Christopher Wheeldon “Ballet to Broadway” programme. Her partner was Calvin Richardson with whom she had danced when he was very young. She brought him to Jersey at the time because he was very talented. He danced a “Dying Swan” solo which was a different take on the usual and they danced the White Swan pas de deux from ‘Swan Lake’ together. Apart from that, he danced the role of Polixenes when Lauren was Hermione in Wheeldon’s ‘The Winter’s Tale’. So, this was the first time that they were really dancing as equals on the stage together. Lauren finds that he has a beautiful sensibility and moves in an interesting “liquidy” way. It was amazing to remember the young boy that she took to Jersey who was now on the stage with her, having made his own journey to become a Principal dancer. He has had a similar year to Lauren because most of the roles he has performed are new to him.

‘Two of Us’ was performed to four Joni Mitchell songs with a live singer and orchestra. During rehearsals, they danced to a recording of Joni Mitchell, but for the last few weeks they worked with the singer, Julia Fordham, to piano accompaniment. Finally, they had two rehearsals with the full orchestra and singer on stage, so that they were properly prepared. Lauren felt quite anxious right up to the last minute at which point she felt more confident that she knew what she was working with. During the slow pas de deux they were either focusing on the lyrics or on the beat of the music. They were in control of neither of those things. This made coordination with Calvin very difficult, and they had to trust each other. She did know all of the Joni Mitchell songs and liked both them and the pas de deux which she had seen before.

Christopher Wheeldon came to their very first pas de deux rehearsal. Lauren had been under the weather, so had missed the previous rehearsals and when she entered the studio to do this rehearsal, she was surprised to see Christopher walk in and felt that she had been thrown in at the deep end. It turned out, however, to be a blessing in disguise, because he was able to show them exactly what he was looking for and that fed the rest of the rehearsal process. The coaches were Robbie Fairchild and Zenaida Yanowsky. Robbie had danced the role last summer with Sarah Mearns and Lauren finds Zenaida an incredible coach, so the whole experience was special for her.

Wheeldon does not give a lot of freedom to the dancers to adapt his choreography, but, as a dancer, you always put your imprint on the dance, as you can only interpret someone’s ideas in the best way possible and the information from the choreographer will land on each body in a different way. That said, he is very clear about what he wants, but he is open to people’s opinions if it works for him. The different casts were taught and coached by Robbie and Zenaida. The process begins with the casts together to learn the steps, then they separate and coaching takes place which is a much more individual process than teaching. By the time Christopher arrived, they were already in separate rehearsals.

Lauren first worked with Christopher Wheeldon in her first year at Upper School, dancing the tango section in a piece called ‘Souvenirs’. She thought she had died and gone to heaven because she was a first-year student dancing with the third-year men! She got to dance it at the “Night at the Ballet” gala for Sir Anthony Dowell. For her it was a magical moment. Up to that point she had not known Christoper Wheeldon at all as he is more than ten years her senior.

Lauren is now dancing the Queen of Hearts in ‘Alice in Wonderland’. Taking on the role of the Queen was an exciting challenge for her as she used to love watching it before when she was playing Alice. It was an enjoyable experience but genuinely difficult as you were forming a whole character. Everyone forms that character in a slightly different way, as it needs to suit your own personality to allow you to find spontaneity. The development of the character needs to be thorough enough so that you can adapt your actions to what is happening on stage in the moment, as no two performances will be the same. Once Lauren had “found” her Queen, she felt ready. She found it amazing to see the ballet from this different perspective. As Alice, she had thought the ballet was all about her character, but now she realises that it isn’t, and she feels that she has seen ‘Alice’ from all angles now. She is coaching the role of Alice tomorrow for the first time.

When Christopher Wheeldon introduced the ballet, Lauren had just been off sick, for quite a while, with glandular fever and the rehearsal period was very intense as this was the first full-length ballet that had been created for about 17 years, and the Opera House was buzzing with excitement. Props were being delivered to the Fonteyn Studio and tested - for example, they had to jump on a sponge cake to see if it was bouncy enough. It was very surreal, almost like being in a Salvador Dali painting as the studio was decked out with bushes and a giant cat from the Lewis Carroll world! It was a dynamic period for the whole company.

With ‘The Winter’s Tale’, Wheeldon turned to a completely different style of ballet. Lauren had not read the play, though she knew of it and had watched it. She struggled reading the play, but, before rehearsals began, Wheeldon invited actors from the National Theatre to do a read-through. Sitting next to the person who was reading your character gave you a sense of the consequences of the character’s words and actions. This was very helpful because by the time they went to the rehearsal studio, she felt that she had something to give the character as she understood her innately. The role is amazing and were Hermione a real person, she is the type of patient, courageous and gracious character that Lauren would look up to. It was a joy to play such an honourable role alongside Edward Watson. More recently she has danced the role with Ryoichi Hirano and César Corrales. These are three very different Leontes. This means that her reactions to the character of Leontes were very different as each dancer would accentuate a different part of the choreography that they had become more attached, to so that her Hermione would also become different each time.

When the ballet was being created, the role of Mamillius, Hermione’s and Leontes son, was played by Joe, a 9-year-old Junior Associate (now in the 3^rd year at the Upper School). He was chaperoned but as Lauren was his “mummy”, he was constantly next to her, and she felt quite maternal towards him. Feeling rather responsible for this young boy helped her develop the appropriate feeling and attachment to ‘her child’ for the performances. Because some of the scenes were quite unpleasant for a young child, there was quite a bit of covering up of eyes and ears. Also, at one point he was on Lauren’s lap as she was reading a book to him and she noticed that the content was a little gory, so she requested a different book.

An interesting note about the ballet is that Wheeldon changed the comic character, Autolycus, into a tree. It is possible that many of the audience miss the significance of the tree. Lauren suggested that we take a closer look at it, and it will be clear what it is about – quite graphic phallic symbolism! In the Shakespeare play, Autolycussells these objects.

Moving on to the ballet ‘Onegin’, Lauren danced the role of Tatianato Ryoichi Hirano’s Onegin. She debuted this role more than twenty years into her career. She had always hoped to be cast in the role, however the first time she was cast, she was unable to perform due to injury; the second time she was removed from the cast and then over twenty years later she was ready for her debut. She feels that it was the perfect time for her, and she was glad that the previous opportunities had not come to fruition. By then she had danced quite a varied repertoire including a great deal of MacMillan works, some of which were not often performed such as ‘Anastasia’, ‘Judas Tree’ and ‘Song of the Earth’. As well as these she also danced ‘Mayerling’, ‘Romeo and Juliet’ and ‘Manon’. Because this was her closest association to narrative ballets, she would have brought an element of MacMillan characterisations to the role of Tatiana. Making her debut that much later allowed her to better digest the style of choreography so that she could be true to John Cranko’s intentions. She was coached by Alessandra Ferri and Reid Anderson. Reid, who was previously an Artistic Director of the Stuttgart Ballet and had danced the role of Onegin, frequently attended rehearsals. His contributions were insightful as he knows everything about the ballet, and he was a wonderful coach. Choreologist, Jane Bourne was also extremely supportive especially whilst coach Alexander Agadzhanov was absent due to sickness. It was clear to Lauren that the partnership with Ryoichi was right in terms of the energy and the tension required for the roles. When she was working on the ballet she was completely immersed in it, living and breathing it: constantly listening to the music and reading the story etc.

Ryoichi Hirano is a great partner in Lauren’s opinion. Their communication in the studio was excellent which helped the process of developing the characters. He is very experienced and has danced with many ballerinas. Their proportions fit well so that the lifts worked and they “fit like a glove”. She trusts him as a partner so that they could take more risks during the performances and be more spontaneous in the moment on stage. This meant that for the audience every performance was different. Incidentally, he is also doing the same teaching course as Lauren.

Recently, Lauren performed another debut in the Waltzin Balanchine’s ‘Serenade’. Previously she had danced the Russian Girl. She found dancing to the Tchaikovsky music “glorious” and she smiles just thinking about it. The choreography fits the score incredibly well and you feel that you are dancing the work of a genius. There are Balanchine ballets that Lauren has not yet danced and may want to debut in such as ‘Divertimento No. 15’ or ‘Theme and Variations’,just to name two.

Referring to Lauren’s mention of her MacMillan roles, David asked if she had a favourite. She replied no as the roles are so different, and they all draw you in intensely. Her first full length role was Juliet in ‘Romeo and Juliet’. Asked if there were a MacMillan role she would like to debut in, she replied that this would depend on the Royal Ballet schedule and, as much as she would like something, it will not happen unless it is scheduled in the repertoire.

David commented that recently he attended an event at the Royal Ballet School on the subject of the teaching students receive on MacMillan choreography. The audience was asked what their favourite ballet was - not just MacMillan’s - and many said ‘Song of the Earth’. Lauren agrees that this ballet is incredible and gives her a similar feeling to the one that she got at the end of ‘Requiem’ where she was standing on one leg on Lukas Brændsrød’s shoulder, bearing in mind that he is very tall and that Lauren, herself, is not at all a short person. She had never been so high up on the Opera House stage. It was a moment that she will “take to her grave” because she was hearing Fauré’s incredible music, was as high as she could physically be in the Opera House, and was reaching upwards with a bright green light shining on the stage which also lit up the audience, illuminating the gold of the auditorium. She felt that she was somewhere else (maybe heaven?). Whilst in the studio she was thinking about her position and how she could maintain her balance, but on stage she felt poised and peaceful and that she was defying gravity, which was truly magical.

On the subject of Frederick Ashton ballets, Lauren commented that she recently had her first rehearsal for ‘Marguerite and Armand’ which she will be performing with Matthew Ball when the Royal Ballet goes on tour to Genoa at the end of the season. They debuted the role together around 2018. During the last season, Lauren performed the role of Titania in ‘The Dream’ and she spoke about working with Sir Anthony Dowell. He has a magnetic presence in the studio and every movement he makes, even when he is just sitting, is “full of the repertoire”. As Lauren puts it: “He is ‘it’ and he has ‘it’” and he knows exactly how to get the message across to you. Everyone looks up to him as he is incredibly unique. Working with him was a potent experience and all the dancers got so much from working with him, especially as they had a great deal of his time. He was with them from the very beginning, coaching with Lesley Collier. Lauren, unfortunately, caught COVID, so missed her last show which meant that she could not bring her learning from her first show and develop it to her next.

Touching again on Lauren’s first real experience of a ballerina when she saw the Margot Fonteyn biography with the image of her as Ondine on the cover, David asked whether Lauren has ever danced the role. She has not but has performed the pas de trois in Act III, also known as ‘The Diverts’ and which are incredibly challenging. She remembers being coached by Christopher Carr. He had his own descriptions of the various movements, such as “huge backbend”, which was a wonderful way to remember everything. Ondine is perhaps another debut which Lauren would like to do in her new era of debuts.

Moving on to Lauren’s extra-curricular life, she also attends many fashion events because she is inspired by learning about and understanding fashion and has a natural flair for it. She is interested in the careers of certain designers, seeing what they do and learning what influences them as well as appreciating their level of craftsmanship. It truly inspires her. One of the really inspiring events she tries to attend, nearly every year when she can, is the Bazaar Women of the Year awards. She likes the publication Harper’s Bazaar and finds it rich and layered with the people they appreciate, support and champion. It is an emotional event introducing good works that women are currently doing, such as humanitarian work and featuring inspiring speeches by women, making it a lovely evening.

David next talked about Cathy Marston’s return to the Royal Opera House next season with a new abstract ballet. Cathy created ‘The Cellist’, which is the story of Jacqueline du Pré, on Lauren. The experience of creating the character of Jacqueline was an enriching experience and Lauren was captivated by her and engrossed in the character. It was a very fulfilling process, and it took over a year to develop the ballet, working with Cathy and the rest of the cast. It was a role that she could happily look forward to coming back to after having had her second daughter and it became her goal to be ready in time for it. Cathy Marston is a very literary choreographer and her use of language plus the way she expresses things taps into your imagination, creatively informing you, as a dancer, so that you can bring the world that she is creating to life using the language of your body, your emotion and your commitment to the character. Lauren always aims to enter the world of the choreographer she is working with, getting “into their headspace” to understand what they are really trying to achieve. She imagines herself as being behind them rather than in front of them, trying to be whatever they are seeing in their mind.

Lauren’s cello was Marcelino Sambé. The rehearsal process with him was very interesting as you would think it simple to imagine dancing with a cello, perhaps even clumsy. However, it was beautifully revealing how much Marcelino “resembled music” and portrayed the cello whilst revealing how much music meant to Jacqueline. He also depicted the relationship between the musician and their instrument and its importance at different moments of their life. Lauren found it a very clever way to involve him as the cello. There were many different ways to explore how the relationship with the cello made Jacqueline feel when she was playing. Lauren cannot play the cello, but she did have some lessons with Hetty Snell, Principal Cellist of the Royal Opera House Orchestra who played the cello for the piece. Lauren found it an incredibly hard instrument to master. On a couple of occasions, Hetty went to Lauren’s dressing room with her cello which gave her the opportunity to be very close to the instrument and understand the physicality of playing it; something you cannot get from just listening to recordings. Even though Lauren had learnt to play the violin when she was young, she did not imagine the intricacies of playing the larger instrument. When Jacqueline du Pré played, she used her whole body and “danced”, swaying, with her blonde hair moving with her. This image of Jacqueline inspired Lauren to dye her hair blonde for the role and make it flow as she was dancing because she saw this as an integral part of who Jacqueline was. Fortunately, even though she is dark-haired, Lauren’s eye colour also works with blonde hair. There was so much heartbreak in Jacqueline’s life, especially in the last scene at Wigmore Hall where she realises that she is no longer able to play. This was the first time that Lauren had created a character with a choreographer based on a real person and the process impacted on her in a different way.

Lauren has also danced a great deal of Wayne MacGregor’s choreography. Her first piece was ‘Qualia’, just after she arrived into the Company from the Upper School. It was the first piece he had written for the Royal Ballet. She was also the second cast for the principal role, danced by Edward Watson and Leanne Benjamin. She danced with Ricardo Cervera. She then danced in ‘Chroma’, the piece that really launched MacGregor’s career at the Royal Opera House. The four female dancers were Tamara Rojo, Alina Cojocaru, Sarah Lamb and Lauren. All four were also performing in ‘The Sleeping Beauty’. The stark contrast between the ballet styles brought a feeling of change at the Royal Ballet and things felt really fresh. Ballet students nowadays are accustomed to MacGregor’s style because the repertoire is well-established but, at the time, the style was completely new and it was “beyond thrilling” to be a part of that moment of change.

An audience member asked whether Lauren might have yet another debut playing the role of Mother Elena in ‘Like Water for Chocolate’ which is returning in the next season. This was food for thought for Lauren, though she was not confirming or denying the possibility.

Another question was about Lauren assigning fragrances to her roles. She has worked with a perfumer for many years and they have created a library of scents for most of the significant roles she has performed. She specifically remembers the Onegin project.

The conversation ended with Lauren thanking David for asking specific questions and David commenting on Lauren’s spontaneity on stage which makes watching dancers like her and Natalia Osipova interesting and going to the ballet worthwhile.

Report written by Herma Johnl and edited by Lauren Cuthbertson and David Bain.

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Lauren Cuthbertson 2025

Lauren Cuthbertson

Principal, The Royal Ballet

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