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Woolf Works

17 January13 February 2026

Woolf Works

17 January13 February 2026

Woolf Works

17 January13 February 2026
Main Stage
Ballet and dance

Echoes, memories, words...

The ballet dancer Natalia Osipova walks on stage in a black dress and bare feet. She appears transparent and blurry, her image doubled behind her as though in movement. Behind her, multiple ballet dancers are blurry as though in movement. They are performing in The Royal Ballet’s production of Woolf Works.  

Resident Choreographer Wayne McGregor’s experimental ballet triptych inspired by the genre-defying works and writings of Virginia Woolf, set to an original score by Max Richter.

Running time
The performance lasts approximately about 2 hours 45 minutes, including two intervals
Approximate running times:
Guidance
Suitable for ages 8+
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Exceptional philanthropic support from

Royal Ballet and Opera Principal Julia Rausing Trust

The 2025/26 Royal Ballet season is generously supported by

Aud Jebsen

Generous philanthropic support from

Royal Ballet and Opera Patrons

Stream previous performances

A Ballet Triptych

The Royal Ballet Dancers Harris Bell and Leticia Dias stand on stage set with blue and dark green projections that appear like brushstrokes to look like the sea as they perform in The Royal Ballet’s production of Wayne McGregor’s Woolf Works. One dancer wearing gold trousers with frilled gathering at the waist stands in a squat position with their left leg bent and their right leg stretched out behind them and their arms are stretched outwards at their shoulders. The other dancer wearing a gold leotard stands leaning forwards on their left leg, their right leg stretched out vertically to create a long straight shape with their legs. They hold the other dancers hand and their right arm follows the same vertical patter as their legs.   

I now, I then (from Mrs Dalloway)  

Mrs Dalloway, Woolf’s 1925 stream of consciousness novel, is set over the course of one day and alternates between two stories: a society hostess preparing for an important party and a shell-shocked war veteran on his way to a psychiatric assessment. Though they never meet, both Clarissa, the protected insider and Septimus, the social outcast, are haunted by the past. Opening with an excerpt from Woolf’s recorded essay, On Craftsmanship, I now I then is a journey into the writing of Mrs Dalloway, interweaving narrative fragments from the novel with aspects of Woolf’s autobiography including the experience of drawing on her own mental illness as subject matter. 

Becomings (from Orlando

on or about December 1910 human nature changed’ – Virginia Woolf  

Written in an epoch of recalibration in every sphere including the roles and rights of women, modes of representation in art and literature, and rapid advances in cosmology, Woolf’s iconoclastic 1928 novel Orlando centres around a fantastical figure who journeys through three hundred years without growing old, and changes sex along the way. Relationships prove transient, even with himself, while relativity and plasticity define her experience of time and space. Becomings presents Orlando’s dizzying wide-angle vision of a vast, ever-altering universe in which life is energy passing through a multiplicity of forms – a brief, gorgeous flaring of insect wings, gestating, emerging, extinguishing and moving on. 

Tuesday (from The Waves

Grand and elegiac, The Waves (1931) is Woolf’s most experimental novel, conceived in response to her own childlessness and the contrasting fierce maternity of her sister Vanessa. In the novel, the voices of six people growing from childhood to old age are punctuated by symbols of natural decay and renewal, the most important of which is the ever-returning sea. Responding to Woolf’s unique fascination with underwater imagery in all her writing, Tuesday merges themes of The Waves with a portrayal of the writer’s suicide by drowning. As Woolf counts her steps towards the river Ouse and her final journey, so too the world of her novel moves towards abstraction and silence. 

Background

In the spirit of Woolf’s writing

One of most groundbreaking writers of 20th-century, Virginia Woolf defied literary conventions to depict rich inner worlds – her heightened, startling and poignant reality. Moving away from traditional narrative storytelling, Woolf Works evokes Woolf’s stream of consciousness writing style with a collage of themes from Mrs Dalloway, Orlando, The Waves and her other writings. Created for The Royal Ballet in 2015 and winner of an Olivier and a Critics’ Circle National Dance Award, Woolf Works captures the heart of Woolf’s uniquely artistic spirit.

 

An exceptional creative team

Woolf Works’ immense power as ‘a ballet of ravishing feeling and radical intellectual intent’ (The Guardian) lies in the potent imaginations of its artistic team. Choreographer and director Wayne McGregor leads a luminous team including composer Max Richter, architectural practices Ciguë and We Not I, lighting designer Lucy Carter, costume designer Moritz Junge, film designer Ravi Deepres, make-up designer Kabuki and dramaturg Uzma Hameed.

Cast and Creatives

Cast
The cast of this production may vary depending on performance date. Go to cast and dates to see these.
See cast and dates
Creatives
Direction and choreography

Wayne McGregor

Costume designer

Moritz Junge

Lighting designer

Lucy Carter

Film designer

Ravi Deepres

Sound system designer

Chris Ekers

Make-up designer

Kabuki

Dramaturgy

Uzma Hameed

Reviews

The Observer
Broadway World
The Guardian
The Times
The Telegraph
The Independent
Evening Standard
Culture Whisper
Bachtrack
Time Out

Access

There is lift access and step-free routes to over 100 seats in the Stalls Circle, Balcony and Amphitheatre. There are 10 steps or fewer to some seats in the Stalls Circle, Balcony, Amphitheatre and the Donald Gordon Grand Tier. All seats in the Orchestra stalls are accessed by 9 steps or more. A handheld bell is rung by Front of House staff to signal guests to take their seats before a performance. The bell is loud and can be startling. The bell is rung approximately ten minutes before the show starts and at each interval.  

We have an assistive listening system available to use.

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See our Accessibility page for more information on access at the Royal Opera House.

Close up of a worker applying clear sparkly rhinestones to a point shoe in the Royal Opera House ballet shoe workroom.

Pointe Shoe Appeal

Every season, The Royal Ballet dance through more than 6,000 pairs of pointe shoes—but that’s just the starts of what our dancers wear throughout the year. 

With shoes in every style and colour, our footwear team works year-round to ensure that every dancer has the perfect fit, allowing them to step confidently onto the stage night after night. Help them perform to the best of their ability by making a donation to our Pointe Shoe Appeal.

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