Sunday, December 11, 2011

American Ballet Theatre in Alexei Ratmansky's "Nutcracker"

Prepare yourselves for a gush-fest--I loved this Nutcracker. The Nutcracker is a ballet that is riddled with problems, and choreographers who present non-traditional versions typically try to solve them, usually with intrusive, overthought "solutions" that are as bad as (or worse than) the problems they were meant to smooth over. Ratmansky sails through these difficulties without significantly altering the narrative, without chopping up the score, and with a great deal of style and creativity. The many references he tosses in, and the narrative problems he solves, are actually so numerous as to be almost dizzying, and they follow each other so rapidly that you would have to know several versions of the ballet, the book, and have a solid grounding in other choreographers' works in order to see all of them. There's no way I can list them here, but it makes for fascinating viewing if you know what you're seeing--and if you don't, it's still a beautifully crafted, entertaining, even moving story.

The ballet opens with a kitchen scene, and if you know the Hoffman story, you'll remember the bit from the Princess Pirlipat subplot in which the Mouse Queen disrupts the human Queen's sausage making. There are mice and sausages in this kitchen, too, but Ratmansky intelligently does not tell the Pirlipat story outright. It's one of many ways in which he hints at the Hoffman story without letting it get in the way. I also couldn't help thinking of Ashton's "Tales of Beatrix Potter" and his Dance of the Chickens from "La Fille Mal Gardee" when the larger mice take over the kitchen after the humans leave. Ratmansky's choreographic style is similar to Ashton's with its quick, intricate footwork and unusual port de bras and epaulement.

In the party scene, I was struck by the high quality of the acting from both adults and children. Usually the party scene has a dutiful, "let's get this over with" feeling to it, but Ratmansky keeps things moving so well that there's never a dull moment. Some choreographers go too far in their attempts to make the party lively, usually with horrible, devilish children, but Ratmansky uses children's natural frustration at the lack of instant gratification in an adult-controlled world (perhaps a lesson for our own times?) to mirror some darker moments in the music and add variety and activity to the scene without turning the children into fundamentally bad people. This scene is rich with witty and funny theatrical moments, and ABT's dancers and the JKO students perform them with real dramatic conviction rather than the cloying, rote pantomime that often passes for acting in ballet.

The transformation and battle scene includes some magnificent stage magic as Clara is shrunk down to the size of her Nutcracker and the mice. Some of the action in the battle could be timed a hair better to be more dramatically effective, but in general, it is an exciting, well choreographed scene, with amazingly well rehearsed students as the ineffective toy soldiers.

The next scene involves the Nutcracker's transformation into a boy, and it includes some touching interaction between him and Clara (as foreshadowed in Clara's sympathetic treatment of him as a broken Nutcracker during the party scene). Instead of the usual snow pas de deux, we see the adult versions of Clara and the Prince, at first mirroring the children, then dancing on their own. This could seem like a cheap effect, but it worked beautifully, with strong acting from the children and joie de vivre in the adults' dance.

The Waltz of the Snowflakes came next, and here Ratmansky displayed his talent for using a corps de ballet both choreographically and dramatically. The snowflakes' choreography had wonderful Cecchetti-inspired steps (I could easily picture the Royal Ballet performing this entire version) and the snowflakes themselves, although beautiful, had a touch of realism with their frosty attitude toward Clara. Perhaps not so different from the way dancers treat each other in person.

It was during the Waltz of the Snowflakes that I thought how beautifully Ratmansky's choreography captures ABT's historical Cecchetti base yet also moves the company forward into having its own distinct style once again. It's not so much a dogma the way NYCB's style has fossilised into a set of mannerisms that no one can join the company without learning, but rather a way of using the whole body from the center out that gives the movement richness and expressivity. ABT's dancers have not quite mastered it yet, but they are on their way.

In Act II we seem to find ourselves with 1920's Chinoiserie influences, and at the beginning you can see what happens to a ballet when the acting isn't good. There's a little interaction between the Sugarplum Fairy's attendants and pages that would be charming if well done; however, the cast I saw was hampered by a girl with an expressionless face and boys who didn't quite know what they were doing. The fantastical, Middle Eastern inspired tone of the Sugarplum Fairy's costume reminded me of PNB's setting, but Ratmansky doesn't use Drosselmeyer as a weird sort of romantic competitor to the Prince for Clara's favours here. Instead, the SPF functions as the Prince's regent (as in the Hoffman tale) and then the divertissement begins.

I have never seen a Spanish chocolate dance that I could recall much of afterward, but as far as that goes, Ratmansky's had a classic and well put together feeling. The costumes provided a creative touch, with extra wide skirts, part of which were attached to the dancers' hands so that they were able to swirl them the way one usually sees the men doing with their capes in Don Quixote. It provided a nice flair and made the dance stand out.

The Arabian coffee dance, no matter how seductively performed, usually puts everyone to sleep, but Ratmansky kept it moving and added a little plot to it so that it kept the audience's interest and even got a few laughs.

The Chinese tea dance was clever and cute, but with Sarah Lane and Daniil Simkin performing it, I felt it didn't make enough use of their talents. On the other hand, there is something to be said for avoiding the usual technical tricks in favour of charm.

The Russian candy cane dance was a funny comic combination of the Three Ivans and the Three Stooges, with a whiff of the playful sailors in Fancy Free. I really enjoyed the way Ratmansky took each of these divertissements and added a little plot or characterisation in order to keep them from being the usual bland parade of tired gimmicks.

Ratmansky allowed himself a pure-dance moment for the Prince's sisters (another reference to Hoffman) in place of the usual Danish marzipan, but even in that, he added a little bit of good-natured byplay between the sisters. His choreography for them was tricky but also sophisticated, and he struck the right balance between allowing the audience some flashier dancing without giving up on the characterisation.

Mere Gigone and the Polichinelles was the usual big-skirted drag queen with little clowns, but the clowns' choreography was so lively and witty that I forgot to be annoyed by the seemingly endless cheery music that accompanies this dance. Ratmansky also threw in a little gag with a mouse (the same one that started things off in the kitchen at the beginning of the ballet) that made the dance more lively.

The Waltz of the Flowers includes a device that many people have criticised: four male bees, wearing masks with large eyes that call to mind 1920's aviator goggles. However, try as I might, I just couldn't hate them. For one thing, I loathe all-female flower corps (Petipa's original scheme called for couples) and the bees provide a way of adding men without dressing them up in powder and roses. For another, well, their choreography is just so cute and witty! Ratmansky gives them a port de bras motif that you'd swear is, in theory, too silly to ever work, but it does. The bees break up the long, tedious Waltz of the Saccharine Pepto-Bismol both via the choreographic structure, entertaining movement, and visually with their costumes.

The climax of the divertissement arrives when Clara and her Prince are seamlessly transformed into the adult versions of themselves that we glimpsed earlier, and Ratmansky does this while leaving Tchaikovsky's score mercifully intact. During the pas de deux, I couldn't help but think how good Fonteyn would have looked performing it--Ratmansky, like Ashton, uses classical structure as a base and then elaborates upon it in all sorts of unexpected ways to create a thrilling, moving pas de deux that continues the narrative. (Which is more than Balanchine's version accomplishes, with its "LALALALALA I CAN'T HEAR YOU" attitude toward the musical climaxes.)

The ballet ends with a device that I usually dislike: Clara wakes up in her bed, wondering if it was all a dream. But this version was both staged and acted so well that it felt logical, with Clara showing genuine happiness as she picked up her nutcracker once again.

Even with all of these positive points, I am not entirely convinced that Ratmansky's Nutcracker will be a long-running classic the way New York City Ballet's is. For the present, it's excellent. I worry that, by removing the cliches to create a more intelligent drama, Ratmansky has perhaps vaguely alienated people who fear change and just want to see the same old ballet with its bad acting, plot holes, and hackneyed choreographic devices. But to me, this Nutcracker is a top-notch combination of tradition, drama, choreographic richness, fidelity to both Ivanov and Hoffman, with just an edge of darkness that throws the warmth of the story into relief, keeping it from becoming cloying without taking over or becoming seedy and nightmarish. Thank you, Ratmansky!

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