DVD + Blu-Ray:
Anna Karenina – A ballet by John Neumeier

John Neumeier uses the classic novel as a starting point for his eponymous ballet, set to music by Tchaikovsky, Schnittke, and Cat Stevens/Yusuf Islam.

Anna Karenina, Tolstoy's literary masterpiece published in 1878, has inspired countless artists and creators of theatre, cinema, ballet, opera, and even graphic novels and television. American choreographer John Neumeier, who has served as director and chief choreographer of the Hamburg Ballet since 1973, uses the classic novel as a starting point for his eponymous ballet premiered in 2017, set to music by Tchaikovsky, Alfred Schnittke, and Cat Stevens. In this exceptional and resolutely expressionistic, even postmodern, production, Anna Laudere brings strength and resolve to the title role, interrogating the position of femininity in a world ruled by machismo, as the excellent Hamburg Philharmonic under Nathan Brock provide the eclectic and enchanting soundtrack. Thomas Mann once named Tolstoy's Anna Karenina ‘the greatest social novel of world literature.’ When reading the novel, John Neumeier was deeply fascinated by Tolstoy's work: not only by the main characters and the plot, but also by the extraordinary variety of thematic connections. It is a story of three families. John Neumeier states: ‘Tolstoy himself wrote and published "Anna Karenina" as a serial story over a number of years. The feeling in the novel of a developing contemporary narrative – similar to a television series of today – is underlined by the fact that the novel does not end with the death of the title character. My challenge was therefore to give true life and relevance to the story by selecting key emotional situations and essential characters to fit within the framework of an evening-long ballet.’

Original title Anna Karenina – A ballet by John Neumeier
Genre Ballet
Recording location Hamburg State Opera, April 2022
Duration 225 mins (Ballet: 158 mins + Bonus: 67 mins / Masterclass with John Neumeier)
Production Company Hamburg State Opera, Telmondis, NHK
Composer Pyotr Tchaikovsky, Alfred Schnittke, Cat Stevens/Yusuf Islam
Orchestra / Band Hamburg Philharmonic Orchestra
Conductor Nathan Brock
Choreography by John Neumeier
Stage Director John Neumeier
Dance Company Hamburg Ballet
Soloist Anna Laudere, Edvin Revazov, Ivan Urban, Aleix Martinez, Emilie Mazon,