47 replies to this topic

[volcanohunter]

Off topic, I know, but I hate Alberta Ballet's new Nutcracker. As soon as I saw it I wanted Mikko Nissinen's creaky old production back. I was expecting a lot since I'd always enjoyed Edmund Stripe's choreography, and he produced a charming Alice in Wonderland for the company, but his transposition to Imperial Russia doesn't work. He gets too many details about how the Orthodox celebrate Christmas all wrong (unless we're to understand that it's a German family living in St. Petersburg, in which case there's no point to changing the location), the story of how the nephew was turned into a nutcracker is told three times in pantomime, and killing the Rat King does not transform the Nutcracker back to his natural self, which sort of makes the battle anti-climactic in retrospect. [The transformation is the Snow Queen's job. Nothing to do with the Nutcracker's heroism or Klara's affection.] Zack Brown's set is mostly, well, brown in the first act and surprisingly spare in the second. [On second thought, it's more like Barbie Garden.] I never thought I'd see the day, but this production has actually cured me of my annual Nutcracker habit.

[Helene]

That sounds depressing.

[volcanohunter]

Sorry, I got sidtracked by my little rant there. Apropos sandik's question, the Goh and Alberta Ballet Nutcrackers have co-existed in Vancouver in the past. For many years Nissinen's Nutcracker was presented as a "joint production" of Alberta Ballet and Ballet BC, though usually Ballet BC's participation was limited to 4-5 dancers, never in the leading roles, as I recall.