Hans Christian Andersen’s dark fairy tale has been reimagined for a contemporary audience at the RSC’s Swan Theatre this Christmas.

Canadian theatre director Kimberley Rampersad has traded Stratford, Ontario, for Stratford-upon-Avon to take the reins of a new production of Hans Christian Andersen’s The Red Shoes at the RSC. Helming the company’s festive show is something of a dream - or fairy tale - come true, she tells What’s On...  

An all-new ‘reimagining’ of one of Hans Christian Andersen’s darkest fairy tales hits the stage of the Royal Shakespeare Company’s Swan Theatre in Stratford-upon-Avon this month, marking the RSC debut of Canadian director Kimberley Rampersad, who usually plies her trade in the town of Stratford, Ontario.

One of Canada’s top young directors and choreographers, Kimberley is associate artistic director of the Shaw Festival in Niagara-on-the-Lake and directed a production of King Lear at the Stratford Festival last year. But she admits she’s still pinching herself to be working at the home of the Bard. 

“It’s such an important institution, and a place where even the mythology of English-speaking theatre and our great canon comes from,” she says, just about keeping a lid on her enthusiasm. “Great people have trod the boards, directed, designed, done incredible technical and other things that are part of theatre craftsmanship. So yeah, it is very important to me… and important for my family too.”

Kimberley’s UK debut is also likely to be important to the RSC’s new co-artistic directors, Daniel Evans and Tamara Harvey, since they’ve entrusted her with one of their inaugural season’s festive productions - always a key element of the theatrical calendar. Although it turns out that directing a Christmas show was Kimberley’s idea.

“When they asked me to be a part of their first season, they asked what I would like to do, and I said I’d love to do the holiday show. I love holiday shows and holiday programming. I love young people - they are my favourite, and I love making theatre for them. 

“I also love making theatre for families because I love multi-generational audiences. It’s such a bonding and beautiful moment when people from across generations can come to the same place and have a theatrical experience.”

Having families and youngsters in the audience changes - and improves - the dynamic and energy levels in any theatre, says Kimberley, but it does bring occasional challenges too. 

“I love young people because they are so honest - if they’re in it, they’re onside with you, and if they’re not, they let you know! There’s something incredibly chastening about that, and I love the idea of people over generations just spending time together in a dark room - I just think that’s community-building and terrific.”

The ‘dark room’ of the Swan Theatre could potentially be even darker this festive season, as The Red Shoes is a fairly gruesome fairy tale, not least because the hero has her feet cut off. Playwright Nancy Harris (who adapted The Magician’s Elephant for the RSC in 2021) says she has reimagined the story for a contemporary audience “without whitewashing the darker elements found in the original”. And that’s exactly how it should be, according to Kimberley.

“It is really dark, but so many fairy tales are dark when you read their first iteration, especially before they have been shined, polished, defanged or Disneyfied.

“Look at something like Cinderella, where the stepsisters cut off their toes to try to fit into the glass slipper, or some of Hans Christian Andersen’s other fairy tales, like The Little Mermaid, where the witch cuts out the tongue of the mermaid. When you actually read them, all these fairy tales are wicked, dark and gross.”

Which makes them sound more like nightmares than fairy tales, but Kimberley thinks winter and yuletide are the perfect times for darker pieces, citing A Christmas Carol (“a scary ghost story”) as the classic example. 

“I think it’s such an important part of the time of year. When it gets to Christmas, darkness is descending on this half of the planet, and in the darkness, that’s when a single light shines the most.”

But before any potential ticket buyers start having second thoughts, she’s quick to point out that there’s plenty of light to balance the shade in what she confidently says will be a family-friendly production full of “dance, music and magic”.

“There are such moments of delight, and it’s the juxtaposition of those naughty and bright moments amidst the darkness that makes this a really delicious piece. 

“Nancy has incredible humour and wit - her retelling invites those of us with past relationships to the story to meet it anew, and welcomes children to meet it for the first time.”

Kimberley admits she wasn’t previously familiar with the book, but the 1948 film version has always been a touchstone in her life, given her background in dance and choreography.

“Dance is my first love and how I came into theatre, and the movie sat in a really particular place in the mythology of dance for me. It’s about the cost of dance, and the over-glorification of ‘if it costs you everything, that’s okay’, or ‘that’s what the true artist has to do’ type of thing. 

“For me, the story is really touching because it’s a dance story. I also love a female hero, and the thing I love about this fairy tale, and particularly Nancy’s retelling of it, is that she is imperfect, and I really cherish a hero who can still be imperfect. Like Hamlet, there’s something incredibly endearing about a character with imperfections and foibles.”

Dancer and rising star Nikki Cheung (“she’s just so talented and bright”) makes her RSC debut in the lead role as Karen, but the entire cast are “wonderful movers”, according to their director and choreographer. And as a qualified dance teacher who spent six years as dance clinician with the Winnipeg School Division, she should know.

“Most of the actors had a movement call as part of the piece, not because they need to be dancers, but they do need to move, and dance is a physical language that’s deeply steeped in our play.

“I really love the amount of dancing in the show. I’m a dancer and a choreographer, so to be able to bring the things that I love and do most naturally to this piece is very exciting.”

She clearly wants everyone else to be excited too, and sums things up with the perfect sales pitch.

“Come and see it because it’s both naughty and nice - just like the season. Come and see it the same way you see The Nutcracker, where there’s a hero who dances and there’s a godfather that conjures - we have those same things in Sylvester, our shoemaker. There are families on the stage that love each other and don’t know how to love each other; there is magic and wonder; there’s beautiful music… and it’s at the Royal Shakespeare Company! In Stratford!”

And just for clarification, that’s Stratford-upon-Avon, not Stratford, Ontario…

Feature by Steve Adams

The Red Shoes shows at The Swan Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon, from Thursday 7 November to Sunday 19 January