Mel Johnson

One of the main themes of the ballet as originally conceived was the availability of goods from the world's markets flooding into Russia. Consumer capitalism at its practical zenith. I've felt that Soviet versions which were successful had a friend near Stalin's ear, in the case of Vainonen, and later Khrushchev and Brezhnev. The pretext was "all the world united under Soviet Socialism". So consumer-based, but from a different path.

Many of us have been known to drink a lot.

Bear in mind that Gelsey Kirkland was born in 1952. By the time she was actively dancing, even as a little girl, she was well into the era when all TV shows were being shot and broadcast in color.

Well, she's wearing a sleeveless doublet based on the uniform of the Grenadier Guards (a single row of buttons), a half-cuirass around her abdomen, which is about as useless a piece of armor as ever was invented, and a kilt/philabeg of no particular place or clan, greaves over her shins, the whole surmounted by a romance version of a classical Roman helmet. (Check out the lion's heads on the greaves. Maybe more indication of Englishness?)

The nymph in the picture is just as interesting as the Guardian Genius. Seems that in "Victoria etc.", all the nymphs wore heliotrope!

O HOLY NIGHT!!!

This may be something I've been looking for for several years. I think it's a representation of the pas de deux from the Sir Arthur Sullivan ballet "Victoria and Merrie England" produced at the Alhambra theater in 1897 as a Jubilee Celebration for the Queen's Diamond Jubilee! If it is, then the "military figure" is none other than - Pierina Legnani en travesti! She danced the Guardian Genius of Britain(here pictured), the May Queen, the Snow Fairy and Queen Victoria at her coronation in the production, which held the stage at the theater for over six months. Choreography was by Carlo Coppi.

With the addition of the reika (the sliding thingie), we lose the irritating line of diagonal bourrées, which never, to me, seemed to fit the very big statement of the main theme in the music. Balanchine addressed the old criticism of the ballerina's first dancing coming "far too late" in the original production, and the wheezy tarantella music for the male variation, which had originally been written for a divertissement in the first act party scene which didn't make it to stage. Structure is very important, but it's not sacrosanct. I think that the choice of artists may have influenced Petipa as choreographic planner and Ivanov as actual choreographer not to make Antonietta Dell'Era, the original Sugar Plum Fairy do too much technically, as she may have tired easily. She had been among the first Italians to come to Russia, but in years leading up to Nutcracker, had been doing mostly opera ballets and musical comedies.

Something similar may have gone on with the interpolation of the Entr'acte from Sleeping Beauty after the party scene and leading into the "magic" scene. That lovely violin solo was written especially for Leopold Auer, the concertmaster of the Maryinsky orchestra, but had been cut from that show, along with the Panorama scene, when the machinery for the latter wouldn't work. The addition of the "bridge" adds just enough logic to the story and also provides time to ready the stage transition and assemble the thundering hordes of mice and toys for the battle. Remember, this version was created on a much smaller NYCB than exists today, and some of the "parents" had to double as mice!

The "bone" referred to is whalebone, which is very light and flexible. In cut-rate garments, cane or bamboo strips could be used. This practice was fairly general from at least the 18th century until the interwar period, 1918-1939, when spring steel sheathed in canvas was employed.

I believe it was Serge Grigoriev who recalled the opening night of "Firebird". Have you ever listened to the brooding, rumbling prologue music and wondered about the sudden break into a "clop, clop, clop" sort of motif? Clop indeed, as it was at this point that Fokine had wanted the Spirits of Day and Night to ride on with horses fully caparisoned. One of them, however was even fuller than the other, and left a...souvenir...stage right. Until all the monsters entered, there was no way to shovel the calling card from the stage, so Karsavina and Fokine did an awful lot of looking down when they got to that area of the stage. So did all the Princesses. The action was strangely shifted to the left, for some reason....

Then, during the finale music, when we hear the return of the prologue theme for the last time, the Firebird was supposed to be "flown" over the assembled wedding party and out. Well, Flying by Foy hadn't been invented yet, and Karsavina flew in, and suddenly, klank, klatter, groan...and she stopped. And there she swung, faking benevolent-looking port de bras until

THE

CURTAIN

FELL

Then a team of stagehands and artistic staff rushed to her rescue with a tall stepladder and a pair of bolt cutters.

Neither effect made it to the second night of "Firebird".

Wolf Trap is infamous for its summer thunderstorms. One year, the Joffrey was performing "Valentine" there, when a violent thundergust passed directly over the place. The dancers were Rebecca Wright and Christian Holder, and they were safe, relatively speaking, but the musician, Alvin Brehm and his mighty double bass were wired, literally, for sound. The Jacob Druckman score for this prize-fight ballet about the battle of the sexes requires the bassist not only to play his instrument, but to mutter incomprehensibly, and perform several percussive effects on himself and the big fiddle. I never saw that ballet ever performed any faster, as the lightning flashes and the following thunder grew ever closer together. There was even a moment when I could have sworn that the thunder was coming before the lightning! As the storm receded to the east, Becky and Christian took their bows, and Alvin (and his bass) took their bows, and I was heading through the pass door to the backstage, where I was greeted by the sight of Alvin ripping all the wires off him that he could reach, and some places I believed he hadn't been able to reach in years! The electricians were trying to calm him down, but he said, correctly, "If you can hear it, you can still be hit!" and continued his rapid de-electrification project. Someone said, "Never again could this happen!" Sure enough, next year during "Viva Vivaldi"....

Male dancers also have stocks of standard costumes. Black waistcoat, white shirt, with or without bow for "Les Sylphides", standard black tunic for Black Swan, all-purpose gray gilet, apple-green tunic, because it goes well with rosy-pink....

Fear nothing; competitiveness can be a positive for you, when you channel the energies into the right directions. Jealousy is bad, emulation is good! You seem to be on the right track.

One should keep ones knees together regardless of seat or location. It keeps one from spreading out into other people's space, like the guys on the subway, who take up three seats.

And in the 4th Ring Gallery, it helps to preserve that Ancient Gaelic Secret: What does a Scotsman wear under his kilt?

His shoes and stockings.

As long as you keep your knees together if sitting in the 4th Ring Gallery....

You've just hit on an original criticism of the ballet. Petersburg writers denounced the show as "some sort of fragile and sugary Nutcracker". It followed a very serious and even grim Tchaikovsky opera, Iolanta, at its premiere, and the audiences wanted continuity in their mood, not relief.

Balanchine's version did about as much to address the original criticisms as could be done, and not spoil the essential core of the ballet. That's the problem with attempts to make the ballet "more Hoffmanesque", or "more relevant". They ignore the harmony of music, story, choreography and decor which makes for a well-integrated ballet. And this ballet is not popular merely because of a seasonal theme. It's really well-balanced, and the most durable productions work within what the show has, and don't superimpose a weight that spun sugar can't support.

It was a 1-act from 1889, with music by Nicolai Krotkov. It was revived in 1895, at which time, Drigo tweaked the score a little bit. I believe it's in the Sergeyev Notations.

I'd have to say the old Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo production with Yurek Lasowsky as Dr. Coppélius. He made the character seem quite dangerous. Roland Petit's was dangerous, too, in another way. He made him a lounge lizard.

I'd certainly have to agree with that. And certainly there is a difference in how the two shows come down to us. The earliest Nutz comes to us in two basic forms, the Sergeyev notations, and IMO, the Balanchine version, which is the "production of record" for many modern audiences, and contains bits and pieces of retained mime at least from the Imperial days. Coppélia is St.-Léon's choreography, but came to us through a Petipa restaging in Russia. The Ballet Russe and Dame Adeline Genée were major players in keeping this ballet alive. Of course, there is the Royal Danish production, too.

The RB version has, over the years, softened the old gizmo-maker into someone who may be a little off, but whose problems may mostly be seated in his being lonely! In Ballet Russe productions, he used to take the nobleman's money and run off with it -- purely mercenary. The RB had him sit down onstage, fussing and silently fuming, until one of the children finds him while the divertissement is going on. "What's the matter? Why do you cry?" He mimes back, "My baby is dead!" The children gather around him, giving him sympathy, and alerting their parents, who come to condole with the old man. As the divertissement proceeds, they slowly, slowly, often during the applause, sweep around upstage gradually reaching the toymaker's shop, then he invites them in! While the coda is going on, the burgomaster and the nobleman hoist glasses to one another and offer one to the toymaker, who appears from an upper window, surrounded by loving children and happy parents. He bends a hook out of a piece of wire, and up comes his glass too. The three mimes then toast the audience as the final tableau occurs.

It wouldn't have been the first time an author went all self-referential!

Unfortunately, I don't know whether that story had made it to Russia, or even to Dumas, for that matter. Vsevolozhsky only credited "The Nutcracker and the King of the Mice" and "The Sandman" Obviously, these have backstories like "The Hard Nut", and some others.

And here's a 1964 program from NYCB.

Between the A cast and the B cast, we have as Candy Canes:

Linda Homek (Hamilton), Gelsey Kirkland, Linda Merrill (Merrill Ashley), Colleen Neary, and Nanette Glushak.

And among the many Polichinelles:

Meg Gordon

Looks kind of like a bumper crop to me!

I've just rewatched the Royal dvd with Anthony Dowell as Drosselmeyer. What a marvellous fusion of balletic movement and character depiction. I wonder if this is how the early Drosselmeier's -- from the original to the Balanchine generation -- were trained to do this role. We have still photos, but can anyone give us an idea of how these early Drosselmeier's actually moved?

It's a good question, because Ivanov and his contemporaries used a miming style that almost nobody knows how to do any more. It meshed near-danced motion with classical pantomime, and sometimes newly-invented gestures to convey meaning. In Nutcrackers today, I guess the clearest example is the Prince's mime speech at the beginning of Act II. For "shoe", he points to his pwn shoe. Another example is the danced lullaby that Clara/Marie does with the other girls in Act I, interspersed with the boys marching through playing with their soldier gear and military band toy instruments. Tchaikovsky actually wanted the boys to be playing the gizmos, but it unsurprisingly turned out just noise, so he just advised Ivanov to have them do it, but maybe just a little softer.

Bournonville preserves this kind of dance/mime, and it can be seen in the Royal Ballet's production of Coppélia, and in a different way in Ashton's La Fille Mal Gardée.

Dowell is actually the example I was thinking of when I mentioned Drosselmeyers who seem about ready to burst into Albrecht. IMO, he takes the dance/mime down the wrong fork of the road. Drosselmeyer is quirky, odd, queer (as Paul has mentioned), although he's not abused by the adults, the kids are sort of repelled by him, until he turns out to be a sort of spellbinder, with magic tricks and toys to show off, like a village's Old Man with wonderful stories to tell. Lidewij is very perceptive to pick up the Dr. Coppélius in him. That's the "Sandman" part of his character. His movements should reflect the same sort of oddness of his costume. In the RB's production, while everyone else is dressed in 19th-century, he's relentlessly 18th! He must be very old!!!

Balanchine's first Prince, Paul "Rusty" Nickel, went on to ABT and stage management later.

Not terribly. There isn't a lot of dancing in the Hoffman, or even the Dumas translation, except en passant, but a theater critic who at least understands divertissement would be welcome. ("meanders" indeed! That's why you go to see a classical ballet - to watch people dance!)

Judith Fugate was Marie for literal years! Several generations of future Maries owe their costumes to her, to accommodate her as she grew taller. Jean-Pierre Frölich was her Prince for a couple of those years.

See what too much Hoffman does to The Nutcracker? If the paper had sent someone who liked ballet, or at least understood the concept of divertissement, instead of the "more-soigné-than-thou" Cofta, a different opinion might have emerged.

I don't know if there's a suite from the Britten opera, but I've considered the story and think there may be a one-act in it. There may have to be some tinkering with the foreboding in perhaps introducing a corps de ballet of "Night Visions" among whom are found Quint and Jessel. Good heavens, I think we've just nearly reinvented Ninette de Valois' "The Haunted Ballroom", except here the boy dies and not the father!