It has tasselled tiers, candle shades, hidden bars, boxes and secret rooms – all decked out in sugar-iced, ornate plasterwork. Because of its intimacy, performers and audience are almost within reach of each other.

All the more magnificent then, the way Moscow City Ballet dancers can refine their routines to fit a bijou drawing room of a stage.

Romeo and Juliet was the first of two ballets staged in Brighton this week – the second is The Nutcracker. Dancers confined their exuberance and exploded with compressed vigour into a ballet which demands virility from the street-fighting men and feminine delicacy from the women.

Everyone knows the story so it was good to concentrate on the dance and the music rather than worry about the narrative.

Valeriya Guseva conveyed Juliet's infatuation, wilfulness, parental rebellion and finally despair with the resilience of a wind-lashed willow. Romeo played by Sergei Zolotarev fought hard against being outpaced in early scenes but his fine, relaxed and unforced dancing delighted the cheering and stamping audience.

But as always, there's one who stands out. This time it was Talgat Kozhabayev who played Tybalt. Looking at his name I wonder if it's a splash of Tartar DNA that's delivered the cheekbones of an Asian warrior, the mouth of Mick Jagger and the leap of a Siberian tiger. He also had the grace to look shocked as the audience refused to let him leave the stage.

Prokoviev's sensuous score came to life under the baton of Igor Shavruk conducting the Moscow City Ballet Orchestra.

These technically brilliant young dancers and musicians are part-way through a rigorous UK tour but at no point did their enthusiasm flag. How do they do it? Perhaps it was the seaside air.