MERE MORTALS
Sadler’s Wells Theatre
★★★½
“offers some truly beautiful and memorable moments”
Mere Mortals is a spectacular production that, from its very first moments, invites us into a new world: an apocalyptic landscape filled with darkness and an unsettling sense that something has already gone wrong.
Created by Aszure Barton, with music by Floating Points (Sam Shepherd), the production reimagines the ancient Greek myths of Prometheus and Pandora through the lens of technological advancement and artificial intelligence. Questions around AI feel like a driving impulse throughout the production, which follows a series of transformations without offering a positive or negative answer.
Hope, danced by Wei Wang, the first figure we encounter, introduces us to this unfamiliar world before Prometheus, danced by Joseph Walsh, brings his fire to humanity. Behind them, Hamill Industries’ impressive visuals, created through a combination of practical effects and AI-generated imagery, evoke fire imagery with elements of gold and organ-like forms, suggesting how deeply integrated technology can become into our own bodies, as well as its value and price.
Humans dressed in black follow Prometheus and the rhythms he establishes. Will this new fire bring light and enlightenment? Or will we eventually become indistinguishable from the technology, losing the individuality that makes us human?
The large ensemble is one of the production’s greatest strengths. With 40 dancers, their collective movement creates an extraordinary sense of scale and, at times, doom. They become almost one organism, which is particularly effective within the production’s exploration of technology, conformity and the loss of individuality.
Floating Points’ impressive electronic score, performed alongside the San Francisco Ballet Orchestra, moves beautifully between delicacy, tension and rage. Together, they create an interesting combination of earthly and alien sounds, with percussive and almost tribal elements grounding the ensemble while electronic textures create something unfamiliar. The music carries a strong sense of narrative, responding to the movement as the story moves from hope towards conflict and destruction.
The costumes by Michelle Jank similarly evolve with the narrative, moving from more organic and transitional forms towards increasingly robotic ones. The choreography follows this progression, introducing repetitive, angular and mechanical qualities. At its best, this creates a fascinating contradiction between the beauty of ballet and a world where human beings appear to be becoming machines.
One of the most beautiful moments comes when Pandora, danced by Jennifer Stahl, emerges from within the ensemble. The sudden shift into slowness is mesmerising. Stahl’s humanoid solo later also creates an intriguing tension between robotic movement and individuality. This reinterpretation of Pandora is particularly interesting: rather than simply presenting her as the woman responsible for unleashing evil, the production explores her curiosity, agency and relationship to progress.
However, the narrative occasionally feels less developed than the visual and musical worlds surrounding it. The duets, although they avoid conventional love-story language and contain Barton’s unpredictable elements, could still hold greater emotional depth and clearer dramatic stakes.
The visuals are impressive, but occasionally they almost overtake the dancers. At times, it feels as though the images arrive first and the bodies follow, rather than the movement driving the visual world. This may be intentional, particularly within a story about technology increasingly controlling human experience, or perhaps deliberately glitching that experience. If so, it might have needed a bit more intentional action or sound effects to better support it.
Ultimately, Mere Mortals offers some truly beautiful and memorable moments. Its greatest strength lies in the extraordinary ensemble, the compelling score and the tension between ballet’s physical beauty and a story questioning what makes us human.
The story is certainly worth telling, and there is plenty of room for the choreography and emotional narrative to go even bolder. Yet the production leaves us with a question that feels increasingly relevant: do we have control over who we are becoming?
MERE MORTALS
Sadler’s Wells Theatre
Reviewed on 9th September 2026
by Nasia Ntalla
Photography by Jane Hobson
