Birmingham Royal Ballet, Sadler's Wells, London

A dying swan

Birmingham Royal Ballet – now surgically separated from its well-endowed London sibling – does enjoy some advantages. These include a cheerful relationship with its home city, an admired current director, but perhaps most envied by the opposition, the attentions of a hugely experienced adaptor of the classics in the shape of Sir Peter Wright.

Wright's Swan Lake, now 20 years old, is a marvel of clarity and good sense. It tells the story straight. And when all's said and done, while we enjoy our Matthew Bournes and our Mats Eks, it's traditional productions that people want to see again and again ... ballet gets to people that way.

The usual gripe about the classics – Swan Lake more than most – is that the story doesn't add up. And in most productions, despite endless tweakings, the holes in the narrative logic are never filled. Is the heroine a woman or a swan? If both, at what point does she switch? And why is Siegfried so gloomy? Surely not because his mother keeps pressing gorgeous, available, foreign princesses on him?

Wright's Swan Lake, co-devised with Galina Samsova, refits the pieces to make satisfying sense. It's all done very simply, and seems obvious once you see it, like a blurry image suddenly tightening into focus.

A shadowy funeral cortège passes on the dark stage as the overture plays. That's the old king deceased, and the reason for his son's despondency (there's one old niggle out of the way). Siegfried's best mate Benno doesn't just stand around like a hatstand, waiting to hand the prince his crossbow, but is the active hub of the Act I dances. And Siegfried even gets some decent steps early on, rather than having to twiddle his thumbs until 20 minutes before the end.

So BRB is lucky. It also has Philip Prowse's handsome designs, showing what marvels can be achieved in shades of pewter. And last week it got a rather good performance from the Royal Ballet Sinfonia, the band apparently recovered after some appalling playing last month.

What it doesn't have, alas, in this paragon of a production, is enough truly classical dancers. Chi Cao as Benno is a superb exception. And Andrew Murphy's Siegfried has moments of lovely lyricism, but spoils it with a stilted walk as if he has gum stuck on his shoe. Laeticia Muller's Swan is big on drama but lacks any shred of classical bearing. Moved I was not. Narratively satisfied – for once –yes.

j.gilbert@independent.co.uk

NIA Academy, Birmingham (0870 909 4144), 20-22 Sept