Many of the stories that I have told in my work have had a sympathetic lead character - someone you feel for, someone whom you want to succeed or to find what he or she is looking for (the Prince in Swan Lake, Angelo in The Car Man, Cinderella, Edward Scissorhands, for example).

In Dorian Gray we have a different kind of story: dark, obsessive and sinister with a beautiful and charming hero who also happens to be a perverse and sadistic killer. Can we care for a character like that? As a storyteller, that concerned me for a while; but I soon realised that Wilde's story was a cautionary tale with as much to say now as it did in 1890. Dorian's discovery of the power of his own beauty and youth begins a journey that turns him into a heartless monster and leads to his destruction at his own hand.

For most of us, the knowledge of youth and the attraction and power that it brings you, are fleeting things. Dorian's tragedy is that he holds on to that power for too long. I recognised this in the novel when I first read it at the age of 19. I was at the height of my clubbing days (1979 - when disco was at its zenith) and that feeling you could have of walking into a club, as a fresh-faced youth, was probably the most powerful I have ever felt.

We are in a society in which people are obsessed by youth and maintaining the appearance of youth for as long as possible. Dorian's wish to stay young for ever seems to be the dream of many people today. We are constantly praising each others' youthful appearance (whether we mean it or not). We still seem to believe it is the way to get on: to find a lover - get a better job?

There is a point, though, when this obsession can turn grotesque and unnatural. We have seen photographs in Hello! or Heat magazines of people who walk round as the living embodiment of Dorian's portrait in the attic. I was also interested in making a piece set in the present day as it is something I have never done. Admittedly, it is harder to comment on your own time, as you do not have the benefit of hindsight, but the more I looked into it the more I realised that everything goes in circles and Wilde's novel was pushing me into a darker vision of the present than I might have otherwise found.

I do not see him as an innocent. I sense that he is hungry and ready for adventure and that he quickly becomes fearless and heartless in the pursuit of pleasure. His narcissism - even the evil - was probably there all along; it just needed someone or something to make him aware of it.

I would say that Dorian is an anti-hero, much like Sweeney Todd, Hannibal Lector, Patrick Bateman and even television's charming, everyman serial killer Dexter. We do not exactly like these characters, but they fascinate us. They are driven by twisted passions; they are highly charismatic and they make their own rules.

I cannot imagine that there is anyone in the 21st century who is still shocked by homosexual relationships. Although Wilde's novel is not explicit in its descriptions of the sexual relationships between men, it is pretty clear to modern readers what is going on. It amuses me when people say that there are homoerotic 'undertones' in the book. I suggest those people read it again. I certainly do not believe that I am taking many liberties with Wilde's story. Wilde suggests that Dorian leaves a trail of infamy, humiliation, suicide - even murder - behind him. Society figures get up and leave the room when he walks in. We know that Dorian kills Basil and causes the death of Sybil Vane. So it is not difficult to imagine him as a serial killer.

Senseless violence and explicit sex can still be shocking to a modern audience, but strangely more so in the world of dance than in any other art form. Things that people will happily watch on television are sometimes regarded as more shocking in the context of a dance performance. Maybe narrative dance has a reputation for being based on fairy tale and myth. Even Romeo and Juliet keep their clothes on; and Tybalt and Mercutio die very unbloody deaths. The story of Dorian Gray is not pretty: it is an ugly story about beauty, if you will, and I think that the staging should reflect that.

I detected a note of misogyny in Wilde's novel, which I did not think held up in a contemporary setting. The two main women are the sketchily drawn deserted wife of Lord Henry and Sybil Vane, a young actress whom Dorian admires only when she is speaking the words of Shakespeare. I have tackled this problem by indulging in two important gender switches. Lord Henry, Dorian's corrupting influence, becomes Lady H, a powerful, iconic figure in art-fashion circles who takes Dorian under her wing and introduces him to a world that he is eager to explore. In the novel, when Dorian announces to Lord Henry that he is 'in love' with a young actress, it strikes a false note. Everything you have read up to this point has led you to believe that Dorian's interests lie elsewhere - a definite case of 'the love that dare not speak its name'. Therefore Sybil becomes Cyril, a male ballet dancer.

Our Dorian does not have an aging portrait in an attic room. I have tried to find a modern logic to that part of the story. I wondered how an image today could be seen by everyone. I decided that Dorian should become the face of a new fragrance. His photographed image would then confront you everywhere: every time you open a magazine, take the tube, drive on the motorway or watch television. There Dorian Gray would be, looking back at you, entering your consciousness.

However, rather than using a decaying image, I have chosen to explore the corruption of Dorian's soul from the inside out. To this end I have become fascinated by the myth of the Doppelgänger ('evil twin'), as portrayed in Robert Louis Stevenson's The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. The Doppelgänger can in some ways represent Dorian's evil nature. In some cultures, however, he is seen as a harbinger of death who follows you round, just out of view, over your shoulder, waiting?

Little did Wilde realise, when he wrote The Picture of Dorian Gray in 1890, that the attendant 'celebrity' - and indeed notoriety - that it gave him was to sow the seeds of his downfall five years later. This was made all the worse by the publicity surrounding the trial of a 'public figure'. Like Dorian Gray, Wilde came to be seen in his own time as an evil influence and corrupter of young men. Wilde, of course, was a brilliant writer and wit and his public persona was just one facet of his genius.

We live today, though, in a culture where to a large extent image and appearance are all and mediocrity is celebrated: fame for fame's sake. In many ways that is what this piece is about. What happens when the spotlight is turned on you? The greedy eyes of the world are on you; access to anything and anyone is yours, you are revered, you are listened to, you are worshipped. Sometimes monsters are created.