For those brought up for a generation and more on the Stowell-Sendak Nutcracker at Pacific Northwest Ballet, it has to be disconcerting to see another version, so familiar in its music and story, but so different in how it is portrayed.
This enchanting Balanchine version had its premiere 61 years ago in New York, has been a fixture there ever since, and now has arrived at McCaw Hall for the first time (George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker™ runs through December 28, 2015). There is still the party scene with the naughty little boy Fritz, the Christmas tree which grows and grows, the battle between mice and soldiers, the snowflakes, and the second act with the opportunities for many members of the company to shine in different vignettes.
Pacific Northwest Ballet company dancers in the snow scene from George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker™, choreographed by George Balanchine © The George Balanchine Trust. Sets and costumes designed by children’s author and illustrator Ian Falconer. (Photo © Angela Sterling)
Seattle was fortunate to have a famous writer/illustrator in Maurice Sendak to do the wonderful designs for PNB’s last Nutcracker, and it was a stroke of genius for artistic director Peter Boal to enlist another such, Ian Falconer, whose Olivia the Pig is loved by myriad children and whose New Yorker covers are enjoyed by as many adults, to design both sets and costumes for this Balanchine Nutcracker, with the enthusiastic blessing of the Balanchine Trust.
It is set in mid-nineteenth-century Lenox, Massachusetts, but the only way we know that is by a video shown stagewide during the overture, as we fly through snow-covered evergreen trees to a village and to a stately home where the doors are ushered open by tiny mice just as the overture ends.
Where in the Stowell version Herr Drosselmeier is a slightly sinister, mischievous figure, Balanchine makes him a loved godfather. Clara wakes in her dream from a roaming bed, and she does not suddenly become grown up. She is a little girl throughout, and her cavalier a small boy resembling Drosselmeier’s nephew.
Pacific Northwest Ballet School students Joh Morrill as Nathaniel, and Eden Anan as Clara in a scene from George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker™, choreographed by George Balanchine © The George Balanchine Trust. Sets and costumes designed by children’s author and illustrator Ian Falconer. (Photo © Angela Sterling)
The battle mice are just grey mice, only huge, whimsically designed, and pearshaped with long tails and snouts; while both toy soldiers and mice are knocked down in the battle, all but the Mouse King are able to get up and continue.
Falconer’s sets and costumes are bright and colorful, with Clara in a red and white striped dress with black sash. The children wander through a snowy forest of silvery birch tree trunks, in which the Snowflakes dance in filmy tutus which float lightly around them, white but tinged with blue just like snow.
The set for the second act, the Land of Sweets, would be any child’s dream of a land of candy, ready to be eaten; but first, the little angels, Christmas tree decorations come to life, glide around the stage in exquisite patterns, each in a wide stiff gold skirt, each with wings, a halo and a candle.
In this act, the story adheres closely to the original tale by E.T.A. Hoffman, so that the dances all represent the sweets offered to guests at the party: Hot Chocolate (from Spain so the dancers are Spanish) Coffee from Arabia (the Peacock), Chinese Tea, Candy Canes (from Russia) and Mother Ginger with her huge skirt hiding eight little Polichinelles (from France), and German Marzipan Shepherdesses, plus of course the Sugar Plum Fairy in purple, the Dewdrop Fairy in green and the Flowers, in cherry and peach.
Pacific Northwest Ballet soloist Joshua Grant as Mother Ginger, with PNB School students in a scene from George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker™, choreographed by George Balanchine © The George Balanchine Trust. Sets and costumes designed by children’s author and illustrator Ian Falconer. (Photo © Angela Sterling)
It’s a fine opportunity to show off many company dancers. No one, not even the fairies, has a big role, but all have a chance to shine, while Balanchine’s choreography is as imaginative as any that he created later.
There were five performances Thanksgiving weekend. Of the two I saw, Sugar Plum Fairies Noelani Pantastico and Laura Tisserand danced as lightly as floating feathers with their Cavaliers, James Moore and Karel Cruz. In a welcome return to the company, Pantastico has maintained the inimitable grace she showed here eight years ago, while the way she uses her head is a hallmark of her performing.
Sarah Ricard Orza made a gorgeous peacock, while the role appeared more effortful for Elizabeth Murphy. Some of the men’s parts are the most spectacular, with tricky choreography and often needing split-second timing. Matthew Renko as the lead Candy Cane twirled his hoop under his feet and over his head twice per leap, making it look easy, Ryan Cardea and Price Suddarth leapt with great timing as Chinese Tea, while Cardea and Benjamin Griffiths did the same for the Toy Soldier in Act One.
Margaret Mullin and Orza were beautifully balanced Marzipan Shepherdesses, Chelsea Adomaitis and Kylee Kitchens as Dewdrop Fairies led the Flowers also with lightness and grace. (Lightness underfoot was something many of the dancers achieved notably in these performances. There have been times in the past when snowflakes landed all too audibly, but not this time.)
Conductor Emil de Cou and the orchestra accompanied the performance with excellent playing and timing, including the expressive violin solo from concertmaster Michael Jinsoo Lim, while James F. Ingalls’ lighting enhanced it all, and Dale Chihuly’s golden star presided over the wintery birch trees. The audiences seemed to enjoy every minute. And at the side of the proscenium, in a painted patron box, Olivia the Pig could be seen peeping over the edge with a red and white striped sleeve showing next her nose.