During his career, Sir Kenneth MacMillan managed to reinvent not just the language of ballet, but also its subject matter: on many occasions he reached for modern, socially and societally charged themes that no one had ever dared to touch in any genre, let alone in dance.

He was met with this criticism also after the 1974 premiere of Manon: even though it won enormous acclaim from audiences, critics were shocked by an immoral plotline that was completely unprecedented in the world of classical ballet at the time.

Leighton Lucas created the score of the ballet based on Massenet’s works: although using nothing from Manon itself, he compiled the musical material from the composer’s many other operas and oratorios, which Martin Yates later re-orchestrated in 2011.

Manon is performed with MacMillan’s original scenery and costumes on the stage of the Opera House.

Ballet in three acts

Performance length: 3 hours, with 2 intermissions.

Place: Opera House Budapest

Address: 1061 Budapest, Andrássy út 22