Gold Standard

Gold Standard

"The Nutcracker"
New York City Ballet
Koch Theater
Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts 
New York, NY
November 26, 2010

Balanchine's version of "The Nutcracker" returned for its annual visit, all of its innocent beauties intact.  The first act is a glorious celebration of childhood, full of beautifully dressed little girls playing with dolls and rambunctious boys playing with guns--no namby-pamby tut-tutting about gender roles here.  Though Balanchine, nor any in the audience, actually had a childhood as comfortably bourgeois and solid as Dr. and Frau Stahlbaum provided Marie and Fritz, the production is full of Balanchine's memories--he danced in the original, and his production salutes the Maryinsky one in many ways, large and small.   The Nutcracker Prince's mime (here performed most elegantly by Jonathan Alexander) tells the same story with the same gestures, the snowflakes have the same pom-poms, the same spectacular tree grows, and, we now know, thanks to the remarkable discovery of Alexander Shirayev's animated drawings--he was the original Candy Cane--that Balanchine reproduced the choreography as he remembered it. 

This very personal involvement in the ballet makes the first act more than the picture of Disnified nostalgia and cuteness overload that most Nutcrackers indulge in.  And the opening night performances were beautifully varied and detailed.  The first act was illuminated by guest star Robert La Fosse's magnificent Drosselmeier.  There was no dark side lurking his version, just an older uncle who loved to entertain children, and who hadn't forgotten that they love mystery.  His Drosselmeier was slightly out of place in the 1830 world, with his old-fashioned knee-breeches and habit of taking snuff, and La Fosse found so many telling details in his movements; I loved the hint of the 18th-century as he danced by himself, a moment almost as moving as the old Countess's song in Tchaikovsky's opera "The Queen of Spades".  His gentleness as he crept in to fix the broken nutcracker for Marie showed a man who hadn't forgotten that children's tragedies are real to them, and should be treated seriously.  This made it clear that the slightly sinister Drosselmeier sitting on the clock was just a child's dream. The child, Fiona Brennan, was a true charmer, and a natural and accomplished actress.  Her awe at the magical transformation, dream though it was, was wonderful. 

The dancing in the second act was first-class.  Jenifer Ringer was a luminous Sugar Plum, musical and warm.  Her cavalier doesn't have much to do (he doesn't even get a name), but Jared Angle partnered with unobtrusive elegance.  The shoulder lifts looked effortless, but his control as he lowered her down was even more impressive, as his slow, seamless partnering made her seem to float to the ground.  Ashley Bouder danced Dewdrop with a combination of delicacy and power; she threw in her powerful jumps and flashing turns but modulated them with a beautifully nuanced upper body and playful musicality.  She can pause seemingly at will at the top of a movement and then charge on while the echo of that shape seems to shimmer in the air.  And indeed, the entire performance will stay in the air for quite a while.

copyright © 2010 by Mary Cargill