Mick Zeni
Dance
Mick Zeni
Italy
Mick Zeni was born in Verona where he began his dance studies at the age of seven. In 1990 he was admitted to the Teatro alla Scala Ballet School and graduated in 1994, the year in which he joined the Scala Ballet Company. He played “Paquita” (Marius Petipa), “Excelsior” (Ugo Dell’Ara), “The Great Gatsby” (André Prokovsky), “Il bat” (Roland Petit), “L’histoire de Manon” (Kenneth MacMillan), “Onegin” (John Cranko). In 2001 he was Albrecht in Sylvie Guillem’s “Giselle” in New York and London and Obscurantism in “Excelsior” at the Opéra National de Paris. In October 2003, at the end of the performance of “Don Quixote” (Rudolf Nureyev), in which he is the protagonist, he was nominated as Principal Dancer. In the same year, he was a guest artist at the Teatro di San Carlo in Naples and at the Teatro Comunale in Florence in “Romeo and Juliet” and “The Nutcracker”.
In his repertoire: “Études” (Harald Lander), “Swan Lake” (Nureyev and Vladimir Bourmeister), “Le sacre du printemps” (Béjart), “La Strada” (Mario Pistoni), “Notre Dame de Paris”, “Le Jeune homme et la Mort” and “L’Arlésienne” by Petit of which he also dances the “two step” from “Proust, ou les intermittences du coeur” with Massimo Murru, then with Benjamin Pech, and Hervé Moreau, two étoiles of the Paris Opera.
In 2009 he is Franz in “Coppélia”, a new creation by Derek Deane for the Scala Ballet; in “Triptych Novecento” dance “Bella Figura” by Jiˇrí Kylián and “Voluntaries” by Glen Tetley; he is also in “Pink Floyd Ballet” by Petit alla Scala and in subsequent tours. Also in 2009, he performed in “Roberto Bolle and Friends”. He is still Albrecht in “Giselle” (Yvette Chauviré) and furthermore, the Prince in “The Nutcracker” (Nureyev and Evgenij Polyakov), Oberon and the Knight of Titania in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” (George Balanchine) in the various Scaliger tour.
At Teatro Massimo in Palermo, in 2010, he was Franz in Petit’s “Coppélia”; also danced with Eleonora Abbagnato “For the last time” by Luciano Cannito. He was a guest of the NCPA Theater in Beijing for the creation of the leading role in the ballet “Marco Polo”. In 2011 he played the role of Eros in the new choreography “L’altra Casanova” by Gianluca Schiavoni and for “Jewels” by George Balanchine he danced in one of the two main pairs of “Emeralds”.
In October of the same year, he played Abderahman and the soloist of Polotàs in “Raymonda” (Petipa-Glazunov). In 2012 he was the Father in Frederick Ashton’s “Marguerite and Armand” and Gremin in John Cranko’s “Onegin”. He was Father Lorenzo in Sasha Waltz’s “Roméo et Juliette” (inaugural title of the 2012-13 season); in “Notre-Dame de Paris” (2013) he reprises the role of Frollo and in July in the opening performances of Nureyev’s “Swan Lake” he makes his debut in the role of Rothbart.
In September 2013 he played the role of Romeo in “Romeo and Juliet” (MacMillan) also at the Bolshoi Theater in Moscow and that of Tybalt on tour in Tokyo. In the resumption of “Another half of the sky” he played the role of Claudio. In “Ratmansky Evening” he danced the creation “Opera” (main couple) and “Russian Seasons” (main couple). He made his debut in 2014 in Petit’s “La rose malade”; the following year he was among the main interpreters of “Cello Suites” by Heinz Spoerli (which he also played during the tour in China in August / September 2016).
During the Gala for the 23rd International Ballet Festival of Lodz he was on stage with “La rose malade” and an excerpt from “Proust, ou les intermittences du coeur”. For “Sleeping Beauty” curated by Alexei Ratmansky (2014-15 season) he made his debut in the role of Carabosse. He was among the protagonists of the “Gala des étoiles” on 30 and 31 October, with “La rose malade” alongside Maria Eichwald. He was awarded by the magazine “Danza & Danza” as best male performer for the 2013 season. For the creation of Massimiliano Volpini “The garden of lovers” he played the role of the Count of Almaviva; for the “Swan Lake” curated by Alexei Ratmansky he played the role of Rothbart and dances in the Hungarian couple, roles that he also reprises during the tour in Paris at the Palais des Congrès in November 2016.
In February 2017 he is staged at the Theater alla Scala, in “Stravinskij Evening” (in “Petruska” in the role of the Moro, choreography by Michail Fokin).
