Three ballet dancers interrupted BP’s third and final Summer Screen in Trafalgar Square, 30 minutes before the scheduled broadcast of the opera Cinderella began.

The disturbance took the form of a short piece of dance based on Swan Lake, with the classic tale used as analogy for BP’s controversial investment in the Canadian tar sands.

The performance featured the White Swan being smeared by an oily substance and suffocated with a cloth. The crowd of opera-lovers were very receptive, greeting the grand finale with applause and cheers.

Charlie Byers, who played the prince, explained:

The tar sands are one of the biggest threats to the future of our climate; they are also destroying local communities and wildlife, trampling indigenous rights, and running Canada out of water and natural gas. It is a key time to pressure BP to withdraw, as the corporation has already substantially invested in the tar sands but will not start profiting for years to come.

BP sponsors the Royal Opera House’s “Summer Screens” where ballets and operas are broadcast live in public spaces around the UK, including Trafalgar Square, for audiences to watch for free. The scheduled performance was on 13th July.

Canadian tar sands are the world’s largest and dirtiest industrial project: exacerbating global warming through deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions, causing rare forms of cancer amongst First Nations communities, destroying vast tracts of forest habitat and threatening wildlife to extinction.

For more information see no-tar-sands.org and oilsandstruth.org
From a press release

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