Ballet director talks from the grave

The former artistic director of the Royal Ballet, the late Ross Stretton, has delivered a withering attack from the grave, accusing almost everyone who he worked with at Covent Garden, from the board of directors to the lighting staff, of sabotaging his brief tenure as director six years ago.

Stretton, an Australian who died from cancer in 2005, recorded the taped interview for the National Library of Australia in 2003. It wasn't meant to be made public until 40 years after his death. However, the Sydney Morning Herald somehow got their hands on it, and have published his remarks, a breach of security that is sure to cause a furore. In the interview, Stretton, who amid much acrimony walked out of his job in 2002, says he was the victim of brazen anti-colonial sentiment - he was the first non-Briton to lead the Royal Ballet - and of an intransigent status quo and a "gay push" that in effect made it impossible for him to do his job.

Asked in the recording, "Did they hate your guts because you were a colonial?" he replied: "I feel so."

Stretton was brought into the Royal Ballet originally to modernise the company, but within a year, after legions of bad reviews, he faced a vote of no confidence from the company's dancers. In the weeks preceding his resignation, dancers from the company had threatened to go on strike in protest at Stretton's management style, objecting to the fact that Stretton frequently made changes to advertised casts.

The interview also reignites the furious controversy over Stretton's directorship, particularly the persistent rumours that he operated a casting-couch policy, demanding sexual favours from younger ballerinas eager for advancement.

Of this claim, he says: "All of that garbage was in the papers, and I can only assume that's from promoting young dancers over dead wood. I promoted nine dancers, young dancers, and that's when I think the shit hit the fan." ·