Chaplin’s City Lights in Dance

From silent cinema to ballet: Charlie Chaplin’s City Lights comes to the stage for the first time in a choreographic adaptation. From 23 October to 1 November 2026, the New National Theatre Tokyo presents the world premiere of a new production commissioned from British choreographer Alastair Marriott and performed by the National Ballet of Japan. Ten performances will open the company’s 2026/2027 season. Released in 1931, City Lights is one of Chaplin’s most celebrated films, which he directed, wrote, produced and starred in. At the centre of the story is the Tramp, who falls in love with a blind young flower seller. She mistakes him for a wealthy man, and he sets out to find the money needed for an operation that could restore her sight. Around their relationship, Chaplin constructs a sequence of comic and dramatic episodes culminating in the film’s famous final encounter. The film was made when sound cinema had already become established in Hollywood, but Chaplin chose to retain the structure of a silent film, dispensing with recorded dialogue. City Lights nevertheless marked a new departure in his career: it was the first film for which he composed an original score, accompanied by sound effects. That music provides the starting point for the new ballet, with an orchestral adaptation by Timothy Brock, a conductor and composer specialising in the restoration and performance of Chaplin’s film scores. The score also includes José Padilla’s La Violetera. The choreography is by Alastair Marriott, a former Principal Dancer with The Royal Ballet and the creator of numerous works for the London company. Marriott is also familiar with the National Ballet of Japan, having worked on the choreographic revision of Giselle under the direction of Miyako Yoshida. For City Lights, he collaborates with Dick Bird on sets and costumes and Ellen Ruge on lighting. The transition from film to dance begins with a characteristic shared by both languages: the ability to construct characters and relationships without words. The gestures, expressions and movements through which Chaplin defined the Tramp find a different narrative system in ballet, while the music originally composed to accompany the images becomes a score performed live by the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra. Several pairs of National Ballet of Japan dancers will alternate in the roles of the Tramp and the blind flower seller. For the premiere on 23 October, Kosuke Okumura will perform as the Tramp, with Yui Yonezawa as the young flower seller.