Article: Leaping wizards of Oz; Australians now occupy the top jobs at the Royal Ballet. Luke Jennings looks at the rise of 'the Kangaroo Mafia'.

Byline: LUKE JENNINGS

"I'VE heard I'm a tough director," says Ross Stretton, the Royal Ballet's new boss. "But the fact is I like people with their own opinions.

I'll challenge them; they'll challenge me." Fighting talk - to brace himself, perhaps, for the task ahead. The former Australian Ballet director takes over a company which, earlier this year, saw the death of its founder, Dame Ninette de Valois, and the retirement of its most celebrated son, Sir Anthony Dowell.

Although he has announced an essentially conservative programme of ballets for the 2001-2 season (Don Quixote, Onegin, Nutcracker, La Bayadere, Giselle), Stretton's appointment ...

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