They say everything is bigger in Texas and when it comes to Nutcracker they would not be wrong. The current Houston Ballet production, choreographed by artistic director Stanton Welch and reputed to have cost $5 million, features 223 characters and is bursting with visual treats, hijinks and physical comedy. It is also bursting with ballet: torrents of beautiful classical movement unmarred by the hokey caricatures that blight so many modern-day productions. Even minor characters show off gargouillades and Italian fouettés – the vocabulary of the academy bringing order and clarity to the jubilant chaos.
The key roles of the young Clara and Fritz are danced by adults – the captivating Gretel Batista and impetuous Simone Acri in the performance I saw – but small children get an unusually broad portfolio, starting with a pair of quick-witted toys who escape from the toy box then play dead when the nanny pops in. The preternaturally poised and exuberant Gavin Paul partners Clara with musicality and aplomb in the party scene, their vast height disparity no obstacle to the young boy.
Aside from the usual mice and toy soldier contingents, there are little mouse medics on the front lines of battle, and a retinue of angels – similar to those in George Balanchine’s famed production for New York City Ballet. But Houston’s angels are tinier, cuter and funnier: they don’t quite glide in the ghostly manner of Mr B’s angels – there’s a little bounce in their step – and they all seem to be suppressing giggles. Equally adorable are the bumblebees with aviator goggles in the Waltz of the Flowers – recalling the original 1892 Russian libretto that stipulated bees dancing around a hive, “closely guarding their riches”.
At a time of increased prosperity in imperial Russia, Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker ballet celebrated the spoils of empire in a candyland ruled by the benevolent Sugar Plum Fairy and stuffed with goodies supplied by obsequious foreign emissaries. (Though Houston’s candyland is protected by massive brass gates, suggesting that the kingdom may have enemies, or fear illegal immigration.)
Welch's re-conceived foreign dances poke fun at stereotypes. Each ambassador is hilariously paired with a spirit animal: foppish French aristocrat with a king-size frog; daft English admiral with a cigar-chomping English bulldog; smouldering Spanish torero with a stubborn Spanish bull; high-spirited Chinese Woman with a friendly panda; steely Arabian Woman with an African lion. They all do ballet and not some feeble parody of exotic dance, with ample global colour supplied by British production designer Tim Goodchild, and Tchaikovsky sensitively rendered by the orchestra under Simon Thew. The one number steeped in folk dance is the muscular Ukrainian trepak, delivered thrillingly by Ryo Kato, Neal Burks and Eli Go. They’re pursued by a lumbering Russian bear who isn’t the least bit scary.
The glorious French-perfumed Waltz of the Flowers featured standout performances from Mónica Gómez and Gian Carlo Perez who displayed nerves of steel in the big lifts. Sugar Plum Fairy Jacquelyn Long negotiated a treaty with Nutcracker Prince, Naazir Muhammad in their pas de deux, both strong and refined. The zany grandeur of Act II was still a downshift from the earlier snow scene, worthy of Narnia. There, the Snow Queen and her entourage held court in fantastical shimmering ice couture topped with spiky icicle crowns. As the ensemble spun miniature blizzards, to the angelic sounds of the women’s chorus, a pair of diminutive glowering demons in full ice armour watched over the Snow Queen – rather like offensive linemen in an otherworldly junior football league guarding the quarterback. The scene is wildly imaginative, breathtaking and comical.
This production triumphs over many odd or outdated features of other versions. The Drosselmeyer character is more genial, less creepy; the violence of battle is tempered; the central conflict is resolved not by one side winning the war but by the quick thinking and diplomacy of the lead female figures. In Act I, Clara steals the Rat King’s crown and runs him out of town. When he resurfaces in candyland, she prevails once again, with the aid of the Sugar Plum Fairy. Her political savvy is rewarded with a big solo in the Waltz of the Flowers suggesting that she is ready for leadership (perhaps a Cabinet appointment in the Sugar Plum Fairy’s government.) But this production ships her back to her family, returns her to childhood. Which seems unfair after she has accomplished so much in the public sphere.
However, after one viewing, there are still details and bits of staging in this elaborate production which I’ve yet to discover – with the not-so-secret hope that Drosselmeyer's magic will bring about a different ending the next time!
