From a Blogger review on Margot full write up http://colonelmoseleysstageblog.blogspot.com/2009/12/colonel-moseleys-tv-reviews-margot.html

Following "Enid" and "Gracie!", BBC 4's "Women We Loved" series which explored the agonies of fame concluded with "Margot". Based upon Meredith Daneman's authoritative biography, the screenplay was written by Amanda Coe who also wrote the excellent "Filth: The Mary Whitehouse Story" (http:/colonelmoseleysstageblog.blogspot.com/2008/06/colonel-moseleys-tv-reviews-filth-mary.html.)

Directed by Otto Bathurst, the film presented the latter part of the career of Peggy Hookham, born in Reigate in Surrey in 1919, who was to become Dame Margot Fonteyn, the only prima ballerina assoluta of the Royal Ballet.

The title role amongst a heavy-weight cast was brilliantly played by the exquisite Anne-Marie Duff. Already of a certain age at the beginning of the film, the camera lingers long and often on the elegant and charismatic Margot who has a chameleon-like quality.

With her almost bulging childlike eyes, her face has a waif-like quality, not unlike Edith Piaf. The similarities do not end there for in that small lithe body we have countless contradictions - the girl from the poor background applying herself to rise to the very highest level of her art.

We see the blood, sweat and tears literally entailed in dance training and the adulation heaped upon its greatest and most glamorous star.

Never a classical beauty, we learn of the cosmetic surgery on her nose and face and the pain from her arthritic feet. The blood soaked ballet slipper at the end of a performance may be a cliche, but here it reflected the truth. It was the price paid for the thirty two successive fouettees performed by Odette/Odille in "Swan Lake", arduous enough for any ballerina, let alone one over the age of forty.

Margot had worked and fought her way to achieve her success and global fame. The pragmatic and almost cynical attitude of Ninette de Valois, acutely played by Lindsay Duncan, towards her slightly waning star, demonstrated the precarious quality of the hard-won fame of even a pre-eminent ballerina.

Before Nureyev's defection, Margot was a jet-setting global superstar and icon, rubbing shoulders with Warhol and really was "on the biscuit tins" (like Princess Diana was later to be "on the tea towels"). Staying at the top of the profession was evidently as challenging as the ascent to success.

At this point however Margot seemed to be "on the cusp" artistically. Clearly the Seymours and other up-and-coming ballerinas were laying claim to her crown and the physical demands of her art were taking their toll. The Royal Ballet even reduced her status to "visiting" artist rather than permanent prima ballerina. Dark clouds were massing on the horizon.

Then Nureyev appeared . The personal and artistic chemistry they forged elevated them even higher in the pantheon of an art form already predisposed to immortalise its leading figures.

This story begins with Nureyev's defection to the West in 1961. A wildly passionate bohemian figure, Nureyev sets out his stall from the beginning, impetuously getting a taxi from the airport to Margot's home, instead of meekly awaiting the car she had sent for him.

Nureyev, played by Michael Huisman, is handsome, charismatic and vital to the core. He is exotic and roughly sensual and his connection with Margot is evident from the outset.

We see the frisson created by contact between the pair hot, sweaty and panting in the rehearsal room. The atmosphere is electric and this supercharged connection clearly translated to the stage and allegedly the bedroom.

We see a raunchy love scene between Nureyev and Margot, twenty years his senior. Their coupling is confirmed by Puck-like gossip, Frederick Ashton, played by Sir Derek Jacobi, who saucily comments that the boy had certainly "***ked the old girl into shape." Confusingly, in real life it appears Ashton confirmed that their relationship was platonic.


image