Sugarplum Fantasy

American Repertory Ballet continues its 41-year tradition.

By:Hilary Parker
   Dancing was not a tradition in the Lustig family. At age 4 in England, little Graham had never even heard of dance school when he first started dancing to the radio. When he learned of ballet school at age 5, he asked his parents to send him.
   "It’s more fair to say I nagged them," he says with his British accent, and they finally capitulated after enduring his pleas for six months. By 16, he was at the Royal Ballet School in London and landed a professional job with the Dutch National Ballet in Holland when he was 18.
   As artistic director for American Repertory Ballet, Graham Lustig choreographs one of central New Jersey’s most-loved dance traditions, the ARB and ARB’s Princeton Ballet School’s production of The Nutcracker. Now in its 41st year, it is the third-longest-running production of The Nutcracker in the United States. Audiences will have the chance to see the tradition brought to life at McCarter Theatre in Princeton Nov. 25 to 27, Patriots Theater at the War Memorial in Trenton Dec. 3, and the State Theatre in New Brunswick Dec. 17 and 18.
   Seven years ago, when he first choreographed The Nutcracker for ARB, Mr. Lustig paid homage to many traditions, but changed a few key things, such as the typical Victorian-era staging complete with bonnets and hoop skirts.
   "The whole story revolves around a young girl who has a strong dream, battles to protect the young man she loves and takes a fantastic journey," says Mr. Lustig. "It didn’t strike me as particularly Victorian." He chose to set the production in 1915, in an era when women were fighting for emancipation. By then, women had thrown off their corsets, and so the costumes could be freer, as could the female dancers.
   This allowed the women to perform their parts in floating gowns in suites of dances interweaving the company and the students, creating scenes reminiscent of early 20th century holiday family gatherings. The tradition of having the children of PBS integrated throughout the production was one that Mr. Lustig was adamant about maintaining, and he relished the freedom to design roles for them.
   His imaginative staging of the ballet in the Land of Snow — inspired by the silver birch forests of Europe — instead of a coniferous forest, gave him the opportunity to create new roles for the children.
   "I could create chuckle-worthy roles of young dancers as snowballs," he says, describing the eight-pound costumes made entirely of tulle, the fabric of tutus. Despite their sometimes comical accoutrements, however, the students performing with the company this year, many of whom have more than one role, are serious and dedicated to the production.
   "It’s kind of like wearing a big hollow ball," says Emily Egbert, a 10-year-old Belle Mead resident, of her snowball costume. This is Emily’s third year performing in The Nutcracker, and she relishes the numerous weekend hours spent preparing for the production. For Emily, one of the greatest pleasures is the opportunity to work with a professional dance company and to learn from the adult dancers and Mr. Lustig himself.
   "He’ll help you out," she says of Mr. Lustig. "It’s really fun to work with him because he’s the one who made it up and you get to see what he thinks about the performance and what he thinks should be done."
   Mr. Lustig agrees with Emily that the opportunity to work with professional dancers is one of the benefits for the PBS students in the production, and finds it heartwarming to watch students grow and mature over the course of their years dancing in the production.
   While the students enjoy themselves, they also work incredibly hard to keep up with the rigorous demands of rehearsing and performing a professional production. The 175 students in the production learn to work seamlessly with the 16 professional members of ARB in The Nutcracker, and Mr. Lustig notes one of the greatest rewards for the students is that the discipline and skills they hone through The Nutcracker will be useful to them later in life — in sports, academics and their careers.
   "Those kinds of things you learn young, that you have to put a lot in to get a lot out. It keeps you true to yourself," he says.
   The Nutcracker is a holiday tradition for families both in the audience and in the production. Mr. Lustig describes a veritable army of parent volunteers backstage organizing the children and helping them with costume changes and make-up, running every which way carrying rat heads and eyelashes, safety pins and pointe shoes. And, of course, returning the children safely to their correct parents.
   Sometimes, parents even share the stage with their children. Nora Orphanides, a teacher with PBS, has been performing in the ARB’s Nutcracker since 1987, and there were multiple years in which she performed on stage with her two daughters and her son. Thanks to their experiences in The Nutcracker, she says, her now-grown children have become "extremely interested and interesting human beings" which led to success later in life.
   There are many families like the Orphanides who have made performing in ARB’s Nutcracker a holiday tradition in the past 41 years, and this year the ARB and PBS are launching the ARB Alumni Association, with an alumni gathering Nov. 26 after the 4:30 p.m. performance.
   While many ARB alumni started performing The Nutcracker when they were 5 years old, Mr. Lustig himself had never performed the ballet when he assumed the role of artistic director at ARB. Commuting between New Brunswick and Princeton, he would choreograph scenes in his head while listening to the score, and burst into the rehearsals invigorated and excited by the music. Even though he was a relative late-comer to the production, he has fallen for it as hard as any lifetime performer, and is as smitten with the masterpiece as the millions who have watched the ARB dancers make their way across the stage since 1964.
   "Tchaikovsky really nailed it," he says. "Creating beautiful, lush, glorious melodies that capture your heart and transform the art form into a new realm."
Graham Lustig’s The Nutcracker plays at McCarter Theatre, 91 University Place, Princeton Nov. 25-26, 1, 4:30 p.m., and Nov. 27, 1 p.m. Tickets cost $30-$40. For information, call (609) 258-2787. On the Web: www.mccarter.org. Other performances: Patriots Theater at the War Memorial, West Lafayette and Barrack streets, Trenton Dec. 3, 1, 4:30 p.m., $22-$34, (609) 984-8400, www.thewarmemorial.comwww.statetheatrenj.org. American Repertory Ballet on the Web: www.arballet.org