Clara Grows Up

Re-imagined Visions of Sugar Plums:  American Repertory Ballet’s Nutcracker has been updated for more sophisticated audiences.

By: Jillian Kalonick

Staff photo by Mark Czajkowski

Dancing in the American Repertory Ballet’s updated version of The Nutcracker are, from left, Jen Bellas as a Bon Bon, Kate Castranova as Marie and Thea Gallagher as a Bon Bon.

   At a time when Buffy the Vampire Slayer is single-handedly defeating demons and the Powerpuff Girls save the world daily, it is no surprise that The Nutcracker‘s Clara is grown up and ready to play heroine.
   In fact, in his updated version, American Repertory Ballet Artistic Director Graham Lustig has transformed her into Marie, using the name from the original 1816 E.T.A. Hoffman story, and made her a teen-ager instead of a child.
   Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s 1892 score was based on a French version of the story written by Alexander Dumas, and it was this version on which Russian Imperial Theatre’s Marius Pepita based his choreography.
   The basic story in each version is the same: a girl is presented with a nutcracker as a Christmas present, which comes alive and engages in a fight with a Rat King. She defeats the Rat King, the nutcracker changes into a Prince, and the two are transported to a magical world where she is honored with a series of dances.
   Mr. Lustig’s version finds Marie playing a more active role. "We’re looking at a story where a young girl projects herself forward in life and falls in love for the first time," he says. To foster an understanding of this more mature Marie, he introduced two new characters into the party scene, Aunt Edith and her daughter, Vera, who is being courted by a cadet. In turn, Vera’s interest in love sparks Marie’s feelings for the Nutcracker, whom she brings alive in a dream in the second act.
   Marie captures attention when she snatches the knife away from the Rat King and slices him, saving the Nutcracker Prince. In the original story, Clara merely throws a shoe at him.

Staff photo by Mark Czajkowski

Young ballerinas at a rehearsal.

   "For today’s young people, Marie isn’t this shrinking little ballet girl," Mr. Lustig says. "She takes responsibility for her story and makes it come forth in the way that she believes is right, so she is empowered."
   Born in London, Mr. Lustig trained at the Royal Ballet School. Although he danced with the Dutch National Ballet and Sadler’s Wells Royal Ballet, and choreographed for a number of professional companies, Mr. Lustig never performed in The Nutcracker, allowing him more freedom to take a new look at an old favorite. "I came to ‘The Nutcracker’ with no muscle memory, no preconceived ideas about how it should look or what it should be," he says.
   The most obvious change he made was to update the time period of the piece, moving it forward from the Victorian to the Edwardian era, creating an opportunity for Emmy Award-winning costume designer Zach Brown to create Gustav Klimt-inspired sets and costumes more suitable for dancing, abandoning the constriction of hoop skirts and bonnets.

Staff photo by Mark Czajkowski

A dance is perfected at the Princeton Ballet School.

   "I projected myself back to that time and thought about how they were thinking of a new century and a new era. I thought about women’s emancipation and suffrage, and about how women stopped wearing corsets," Mr. Lustig says.
   His goal was to create a Nutcracker more in tune with the company. Marie as a child is played by a student, but the dream Marie is played by a company member to demonstrate her emotional maturity. "There’s a sensuality behind the whole work, which has much more to do with what American Repertory Ballet is," he says. "I tried to create dances that would suit my dancers and stretch them technically, physically and emotionally."
   However, with two-and-a-half casts comprising more than 200 children, Mr. Lustig has not lost the concept of The Nutcracker as a childhood rite of passage and a community endeavor. Drummer mice, toy soldiers and snowballs have been filing through the Princeton Ballet School’s studios for the past few months, spending their autumn weekends rehearsing.
   Mr. Lustig has also altered the production to demonstrate a sense of unity between generations, an element he found lacking in other productions. In the party scene, different ages are integrated: Children dance with adults and do a more mature dance themselves, reflecting a more enlightened time period.

Staff photo by Mark Czajkowski

Kate Castranova as Marie, the character previously known as Clara.

   Besides trying to create a Nutcracker not seen anywhere else, Mr. Lustig wanted to update the American Repertory Ballet’s production to suit a new generation. "I tried to think of the young people sitting in the audience," he says. "Nowadays, children don’t only want saccharine."
   A new version is refreshing after enduring Tchaikovsky’s score on Muzak in Macy’s and Barbie in The Nutcracker on network television. At the beginning of a new millennium and the end of a difficult year, audiences should welcome a new take on a classic, as Mr. Lustig envisions: "At any given time, artists try to look forward when they create something new. ‘The Nutcracker’ was brand new in 1892. They were thinking about the future."
The American Repertory Ballet will perform The Nutcracker at McCarter
Theatre, 91 University Place, Princeton, Nov. 21, 7 p.m.; Nov. 23-25, 1 and
4:30 p.m.; Nov. 26, 7 p.m. Tickets cost $26-$38. For information, call (609)
258-2787. On the Web: www.mccarter.org.
ARB will perform with the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra and the Newark Boys
Choir at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center, 1 Center St., Newark, Dec.
7, 7 p.m.; Dec. 8, 1:30 and 6 p.m. Tickets cost $30-$40. For information, call
(800) 255-3476. On the Web: www.njpac.org.
ARB will perform with the New Brunswick Public Schools Honors Chorus at the
State Theatre, 15 Livingston Ave., New Brunswick, Dec. 15-16, 1 and 4:30 p.m.
Tickets cost $20-$32. For information, call (732) 246-7469. On the Web: www.statetheatrenj.org.
ARB will perform at Patriots Theater at the War Memorial, Barrack and Lafayette
streets, Trenton, Dec. 22, 1 and 4:30 p.m. Tickets cost $20-$32. For information,
call (609) 984-8400. On the Web: www.thewarmemorial.com

Staff photo by Mark Czajkowski

Artistic Director Graham Lustig watches his dancers rehearse.

OTHER NUTCRACKER PRODUCTIONS: The International Ballet Theatre will
perform The Nutcracker at The Theatre at Raritan Valley Community College,
Somerville, Dec. 14, 7 p.m.; Dec. 15, 2 p.m. Tickets cost $22-$27. For information,
call (908) 218-8867.

   Roxey Ballet Company will perform The Nutcracker at the New Hope-Solebury School, Steven J. Buck Theater, 180 W. Bridge St., New Hope, Pa., Nov. 23, 7 p.m.; Nov. 24, 3 and 7 p.m.; Nov. 25, 3 p.m. Tickets cost $20; $18 seniors/disabled. For information, call (609) 397-7616.

   The Belle Mead Ballet will perform The Nutcracker at the Kelsey Theatre, Mercer County Community College, 1200 Old Trenton Road, West Windsor, Dec. 1-2, 1 and 4 p.m. Tickets cost $12; $10 seniors/students/children. For information, call (609) 584-9444.

   The West Windsor-Plainsboro Dance Company will perform a narrated version of The New Age Nutcracker at the Community Middle School, Grovers Mill Road, Plainsboro, Dec. 15, 7 p.m.; Dec. 16, 2 p.m. Tickets cost $6; $7 at the door. For information, call (609) 799-6141.
   Bucks County Ballet Theatre, The Dance Conservatory, Pennsbury High School, 705 Hood Blvd., Fairless Hills, Pa., The Nutcracker Dec. 14-15, Fri. 8 p.m., Sat. 2 and 7 p.m., preview Thu., Dec. 13, 7:30 p.m., $15; (215) 946-0100.
   Donetsk Ballet Company, Annenberg Center, Zellerbach Theatre,
3680 Walnut St., Philadelphia, The Nutcracker Dec. 1, 2 p.m.; Highlights
from Sleeping Beauty and The Nutcracker, Dec. 1, 7:30 p.m., $30, $15 student;
www.annenbergcenter.org;
(215) 898-3900.
   Pennsylvania Ballet, Academy of Music, Broad Street, Philadelphia,
George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker Dec. 14-31, $17-$90; www.paballet.org;
(215) 551-7000.