Dracula
★★★☆☆ Jukebox Ballet
Festival Theatre: Fri 12-Sun 14 Jun 2026
Review by Rebecca Mahar
Big Live sweep onto the Festival Theatre stage with a limited engagement of Dracula: Ballet at its Darkest, a new adaptation of the classic Bram Stoker horror. Promising lavish Gothic visuals and visceral storytelling, this is a ballet simmering with potential. Potential which is not yet fulfilled.
Choreographed by the Australian company’s Artistic Director Joel Burke, Dracula opens on a seventeenth century battlefield, where the formidable Vlad cuts his way through enemy after enemy. After learning that his wife has been killed by the Church, he sells his soul and transforms into Dracula.
A scene from Dracula. Pic: Big Live
Cut to two hundred years later at the wedding of Jonathan and Mina Harker, who are gifted a honeymoon in Transylvania, and end up unknowingly sleeping under Dracula’s roof. There they are accosted by four Ghosts, spectral women in white who lead Mina to an encounter with Dracula — but upon seeing her face, he can only see his long lost wife, and so the knife begins to twist.
As adaptations go, it’s a compelling take. Focusing on interpersonal romantic and obsessive agonies, amplified by vampiric transformation, this is a version of Dracula that allows plenty of space for balletic storytelling and the embrace of romanticism within horror.
Burke’s choreography is full of motifs that run through the ballet without being heavy-handed, and rises to its peak in the pas de deux between Dracula (Ervin Zagidullan) and Mina (Abbey Hansen) in act two.
formidable presence
Zagidullan commands the power of Dracula throughout, with formidable presence and technical mastery, but his greatest strength and nuance is in Vlad’s yearning. Hansen, meanwhile, handles the extremes of delighted love, horrified fear, and fateful determination with admirable artistry.
In the uncredited role of Jonathan Harker, Friday night’s performer exhibited both technical excellence in chaînés and jetés en manège of incredible speed, as well as aching pathos after his unwelcome transformation.
The four Ghosts. Pic: Big Live.
From the company, there are standout performance from the Ghosts, also referred to as the Brides, who maintain an unnerving spectrality to their dancing throughout, precise and working perfectly as a unit, with moments of vicious individual flair.
The tragedy of this ballet lies not in its story, but its music. Jason Fernandez’s original composition struggles to unite the patchwork of well-known pieces that have been selected to score the ballet, a collection of classical music’s greatest spooky hits.
particularly groan-worthy
From A Night On Bald Mountain to Dies Irae to Lacrimosa to a particularly groan-worthy use of Toccata and Fugue, and beyond, the score’s instantly recognisable music emphasises itself rather than serving the ballet.
It jolts from style to style, mood to mood and era to era. It attempts to create an atmosphere from whole cloth when a much more cohesive and well-structured musical narrative would have emerged if Fernandez had simply been allowed to compose the entire ballet. Opinions on jukebox musicals and their quality may vary, but they typically possess a stylistic unity; a lesson this Dracula has not taken on board.
A scene from Dracula. Pic: Big Live
In addition to the questionable choices of music, the audio quality leaves much to be desired. A live orchestra is almost always preferable, although there’s much to be said in favour of pre-recorded music in terms of economies and increasing the accessibility of touring, and a well-executed recording can stand up to considerable scrutiny.
However, the music of Dracula has not been mixed and mastered to give the impression that it is coming from the same place, instead it appears as if tracks from entirely different sources have simply been plonked into position.
Worse, there is a peculiar and grating tinned quality throughout. This is particularly egregious in act one’s Clair de Lune, which sounds as if it has been recorded on a cheap clip-on mic from inside the piano, resulting in a painful, feedback-like resonance.
other pitfalls
The music and its regrettable engineering carry the lion’s share of Dracula’s sins, but there are other pitfalls as well.
Certain narrative elements are unclear and choreographic choices illogical; Steven May’s uneven lighting design vacillates between brilliance and pedestrian cliché; transitions are either perfectly executed or awkwardly silent; the opening battle lacks detail and threat; the ending is rushed; and Dracula’s one brief moment of flight is woefully misused.
Exceptional performances and a concerted effort at visual splendour can only carry this production so far. With a strong vision and compelling story at its heart, this Dracula has the potential to be extraordinary: what it requires is to step out of the shadow of what has gone before, and claim its own unique place in the vast night of Stoker-inspired vampiric art.
Running time: Two hours with one interval
Festival Theatre, 13-29 Nicolson Street EH8 9FT
Friday 12 – Sunday 14 June 2026
Fri: 7.30pm; Sat, 2.30pm & 7.30pm; Sun: 1.30pm & 6.30pm.
Tickets and details: Book here.
Big Live website: https://bigliveco.com
Facebook: @balletinternationalgala
Instagram: @bigliveco
TikTok: @bigliveco
A scene from Dracula. Pic: Craig-Ratcliffe
ENDS
