The culture minister, Per Stig Møller, has told the Royal Danish Theatre’s leadership on that it needs to deal with the mounting controversy surrounding allegations of widespread cocaine abuse at the Royal Ballet.
The culture minister’s comments followed on the heels of sharp criticism on Thursday of Royal Danish Theatre managing director Erik Jacobsen for dismissing the allegations of drug abuse at the Royal Ballet, which falls under his leadership, as “undocumented” rumours.
Earlier in the day, Møller himself had also downplayed the controversy, calling the allegations an “internal personnel affair”. Later, however, as criticism from opposition politicians grew, he changed that message and urged Jacobsen to “take care of the problem”. Møller emphasised that he was confident they would deal with the issue properly.
The accusations of rampant cocaine use by the ballet’s dancers and appeared first in an internal study commissioned by the Royal Danish Ballet itself and completed on March 15. In the report several anonymous employees claim that cocaine abuse is widespread at the ballet. They also complain of mismanagement and unprofessional, temperamental leadership from Hübbe.
In a written statement to the press early Thursday morning, Jacobsen criticised the employees who spoke anonymously in the report, writing that the other dancers and director “don’t deserve this anonymous suspicion”.
In addition to the allegations in the study, four dancers from the Royal Danish Ballet speaking to Jyllands-Posten newspaper on condition of anonymity said the stories of widespread drug abuse were true.
“After the premier of ‘Sleeping Beauty’ (in 2010, ed.) four or five young dancers came down in the elevator from [Hübbe’s] office. The youngest was 19, and they told everybody in the room that they had just done cocaine with [Hubbe],” one dancer told Jyllands-Posten.
None of the four dancers who spoke anonymously with Jyllands-Posten reports actually ever seeing Hübbe take cocaine.
Hübbe is quoted in the internal report as saying: “Nobody lives in New York for 15 years without trying cocaine.”
At a company meeting held to address the allegations in the study, Hübbe allegedly offered to take a urine test on the spot, to prove he was not on drugs. The Royal Danish Theatre’s leadership did not take him up on the offer.
“We can’t throw suspicion on people in that way,” Jacobsen told Jyllands-Posten, “In a society governed by the rule of law we are obliged to take people at their word, even if there are well-documented complaints.”
The Social Dem’s culture spokesperson Mogens Jensen led the opposition in calling on Møller to bring the Royal Danish Theatre and Jacobsen to task on taking the report seriously and explaining why he was sure there was nothing behind the allegations in the study, reports Berlingske newspaper.
The drug allegations come at a time when the Royal Danish Ballet was just celebrating the major accomplishment of having completed in June its largest US tour in 50 years.
0 comments:
Post a Comment