Tony and Del of Ibiza and Anthony and Derek of Ramsbottom, two sets of twins born of Spanish holiday romances and separated at birth, find themselves, to the confusion and chaos of all, on the same party island one summer.

Shortly after our collaboration on our 2012 Olympics-inspired piece, Faster, composer Matthew Hindson and I decided it was time that we thought about a larger scale ballet and in searching for a subject which would showcase Matthew’s music to its best advantage I lighted on Shakespeare’s play The Comedy of Errors. Just as George Gershwin didn’t write jazz, but composed orchestral music during the Jazz Age, so Matthew’s music, whilst displaying all the best qualities of contemporary orchestral composition often reflects the influence of current popular music like disco, metal, techno and rave and so I arrived at the idea of updating the story from Shakespeare’s classical Ephesus to a present day Ibiza.

In the 1970s, sun-starved Brits flock to Spain’s Costa del Sol and, as with many young women, Dawn and Kimberley fall under the spell of the exotic locals, the result being a trip to the maternity ward nine months later, where the girls each give birth to twin baby boys.

Thirty-some years later, the Spanish island of Ibiza is the central destination for Europe’s party seeking youth, with it’s all-night raves and boisterous dance scene, and it is here that Dawn and Kimberley, still young at heart, vacation with their sons Anthony and Derek. Little do they know that their other sons, Tony and Del, twin brothers of Anthony and Derek, and given up for adoption at birth, are also on the island. What could possibly go wrong? 

A Comedy of Errors was commissioned by Sarasota Ballet and premiered at the Van Wezel Theatre Sarasota on March 25th 2022.  

‘Fun, funny, foible-filled and fantastic… should be performed near and far and become a valued and permanent part of the contemporary dance canon’
SARASOTA HERALD TRIBUNE

‘Warm-hearted, ebullient, and pleasing to the eye and ear’
FJORD REVIEW

‘The company received (and deserved) an immediate and prolonged standing ovation’
REGISTRY TAMPA BAY

‘The audience showered thunderous applause… rare and memorable’
BALLET HERALD

‘Bintley does a wonderful job telling the story… the entire cast contributes to the laugh-out-loud moments'
YOUR OBSERVER