One way of spending the wettest of bank holiday Mondays was to go to fair Verona and make a day of it. The Verona, that is, of Kenneth MacMillan’s Romeo and Juliet at Covent Garden, returning for its end-of-season performances with notable debuts in its challenging title roles from Marianela Nuñez and Thiago Soares at the matinee, and Sarah Lamb with an experienced Romeo, Viacheslav Samodurov, in the evening.

An Argentinian with a Brazilian, and an American with a Russian, all playing hot-blooded Italians in a British modern classic ballet. The composer, Prokofiev, was Russian, as is the conductor, Boris Gruzin, who leads a powerful account of the great score. The designer, Nicholas Georgiadis, was Greek. MacMillan, by the way, was Scottish, while Shake-speare – hold your breath – was English, but also universal.

It would be hard to choose between the two Juliets, the petite Nuñez and the taller Lamb, in the accomplishment of their dancing – fleet, poised and radiant. And both give performances of dramatic intelligence with nice distinctions of detail. I like Nuñez’s little giggle in her flirtation with Romeo across the crowded ballroom. In the tumult of rows with parents, Lamb conveys emotions in a less externalised way than Nuñez, but equally effectively. Both make you aware of a torrent of thoughts as they sit on the bed reviewing a desperate situation. They die differently (so do their Romeos) – Lamb just reaching her lover’s hand, Nuñez not quite.

Soares has a cheeky face and plays Romeo to match – as one of the lads; Samodurov is more of the dreamer. Yet after killing Tybalt, Soares is on his knees, weeping. Samodurov hurls down his rapier – “There, I’ve done it” – before the horror dawns. Soares’s dancing had more spirit and attack; Samodurov was less secure and air-borne than usual, but his character more subtle. In MacMillan’s great love duets, I was conscious with Nuñez and Soares of meticulous attention and placement, but the element of surrender throbbed with Lamb and Samodurov.

Below stairs (and there are many of them), at the Opera House’s Linbury, we saw another aspect of the Royal Ballet in New Works, an experimental programme of six pieces, five created by company dancers. The show was dedicated to the memory of Norman Morrice, a tireless promoter of new choreographic talent at the Royal Ballet and its school.

There is no doubt – as we have seen before – of the young Liam Scarlett’s developing talent. His latest piece, Of Mozart, ambitiously tackles the full Piano Concerto No 23. Matching a fine performance by Robert Clark (piano) and the Southbank Sinfonia under Alice Farnham, Scarlett shows complete confidence in his deployment of eight dancers in fluid movement, classical with intriguing quirky inflections. The stage fills like a whirlpool, then clears to focus on Laura Morera and Bennet Gartside in a curious emotional undercurrent in the slow-movement duet. All get chances within a strong sense of a unity.

In Stop Me When I’m Stuck, to a new score by Graham Fitkin, Jonathan Watkins explored the theme of individuals and the group, with knotted complexities and a sudden rush to the front that (intentionally, but to our surprise) left five dancers teetering on the edge of the stage. Ernst Meisner’s duet What If . . . was a fragment of brisk light-heartedness. Samodurov’s contribution, , put Lamb and Ivan Putrov under a trundled spotlight to scrutinise an intense, perplexing relationship. Vanessa Fenton’s Monument mooned about death and memory (she’s done better things), while the “outsider” choreographer Matjash Mrozewski’s Agitator wasted the best efforts of Isabel McMeekan and Thomas Whitehead in a strenuous yawn.

So, not all were winners, but Scarlett got the acclaim he deserved. The Royal Ballet, with its eye to the future, may well have high hopes of him.

Editor's choice

• Are Glasvegas the new Oasis?
• Proms Podcast with Stephen Hough
• Vote for musical perfection