Gillian Freeman wrote the scenario for Kenneth MacMillan’s psychologically thrilling ballet Mayerling.
The Royal Ballet will be performing Mayerling from 30th March to 18th May at The Royal Opera House in Covent Garden. Tickets for the production are available now!
An intoxicating mix of dangerous desires, family secrets and political intrigue spirals into a royal disaster.
Crown Prince Rudolf is tormented by dark obsessions, fixated by the idea of his own death. He cannot find solace in friends and family, except for one person: the young and beautiful Baroness Mary Vetsera. She too, shares his morbid interests. Stifled by the oppressive conventions and pageantry of the Austro-Hungarian court, Rudolf and Mary start meeting in secret. As fervent desire combines with a fascination of death, what begins as a clandestine love affair hurtles towards tragedy.
Gillian was a writer and novelist from London. Creating the scenario for Mayerling was her Royal Ballet debut in 1978, and she returned in 1981 to create the scenario for MacMillan’s Isadora. Her novels include The Liberty Man, The Leader, The Alabaster Egg, But Nobody Lives in Bloomsbury, and The Leather Boys, which was recently republished in the UK by Dead Ink Books.
