Photos: American Ballet Theatre Celebrates North American Premiere of Wayne McGregor's WOOLF WORKS

American Ballet Theatre just celebrated the North American Premiere of Wayne McGregor's Woolf Works at Segerstrom Center for the Arts. The production runs through 14, 2024. Check out photos from the opening night performance below!

Inspired by the writings of 20th century modernist author Virginia Woolf, Woolf Works marks American Ballet Theatre's first full-length production by McGregor, featuring a luminous original score by Max Richter. The creative team is completed by McGregor's longstanding collaborators lighting designer Lucy Carter, dramaturg Uzma Hameed, costume designer Moritz Junge, film designer Ravi Deepres, and architects Ciguë and We Not I on set design.

McGregor's multi-award-winning ballet triptych is inspired by three of Woolf's seminal novels –   Mrs. Dalloway, Orlando, and The Waves – along with her letters and diary entries and follows the writer's style in its unconventional structure and collision of ideas.

Renowned for his ground-breaking choreography and collaborations, McGregor mirrors Woolf's modernist rejection of neatly ordered narrative, in favor of heightened, startling perspectives. He presents each of the three parts as distinct, multi-sensory collages – “I now, I then,” “Becomings,” and “Tuesday” – bringing to life Woolf's world of “granite and rainbow” where human beings are at once both physical body and uncontained essence. For the final act, “Tuesday,” Gillian Anderson has recorded Virginia Woolf's haunting suicide note.