With a new take on a classic tale, the Russian Ice Stars were back with their latest spectacular, Snow White. Exploding on to the iced-over New Theatre stage with thrilling skating, it also featured lush costumes and sets, plus some cunning theatrical effects that I can’t work out how they did. The show is very Russian in feel, and this is a very good thing.

There are no cheesy Disneyesque influences here but it is permeated with European folk tradition. Balletic, dramatic and interspersed with some great circus performances, no other company on the road could deliver quite this type of entertainment. Each member of the company shone in their ‘spotlight’ moments. As they were whizzing about with such grace and daring I was struck with how this level of ice dance is so akin to ballet – just much, much faster! From among the very high-calibre cast I was particularly struck with the performances of Svetlana Kuprina as Queen Drina, the evil stepmother, to the fresh and innocent Snow White of Irina Tkachuk. These two (pictured) spark off each other brilliantly in their pas de deux, one epitomising darkness and the other light. I was also delighted by the comic turn of Ekaterina Murugova and Sergei Smirnov as geese who lead the abandoned Snow White to the safety of the Woodcutters’ House – they were rather like The Magic Flute’s Papageno and Papegena, I thought.

Bringing all the elements of the story together, the composer Maestro Silvio Amato had created a lovely score, bringing out all the chiaroscuro that forms the folk tale. The choreographer and artistic director Cavaliere Guiseppe Arena is clearly a man who knows how to tell a story with excitement and visual complexity, and, unlike the pyrotechnical skating nuggets we see in ice dancing competitions, this show gives us sustained narrative and emotional involvement in the story. Excellent entertainment for all ages.