United Kingdom Sir Peter Wright’s The Nutcracker: Dancers of The Royal Ballet, College students of The Royal Ballet Faculty, The Schola Cantorum of The London Oratory Faculty, London Oratory Junior Choir (director: Charles Cole), Orchestra of the Royal Opera Home / Charlotte Politi (conductor). Broadcast dwell (directed by Peter Jones) for the Royal Opera Home, Covent Backyard, to Cineworld Basildon, Essex, 10.12.2025. (JPr)
It’s Christmas at Covent Backyard so it should be Sir Peter Wright’s The Nutcracker; effectively not yearly truly, as final 12 months it gave strategy to a brand new Cinderella and avoiding the conflict with the English Nationwide Ballet’s revisionist new model (evaluate right here). Again in 2025 the opening night time of the present run of performances celebrated the 99th birthday of the choreographer (with the corporate trying ahead to his hundredth), in addition to the latest fortieth anniversary of Sir Peter Wright’s manufacturing itself! The sold-out performances are justification sufficient for the limitless revivals of this ‘Festive custom’; although it doesn’t advance the artwork type in any means. Additionally, because the Director of The Royal Ballet, Kevin O’Hare, revealed ‘it’s probably the most quantity of recent audiences coming to this efficiency than every other manufacturing we do. So, whether or not it’s within the cinema or whether or not it’s right here within the Royal Opera Home, there are such a lot of individuals coming to see it for the primary time.’
An intriguing 2016 movie I just lately caught up with on Sky Arts, ENB in Paris, from Michael Nunn and William Trevitt concludes with a hilarious sequence involving a few of these seen within the documentary making an attempt – and failing! – to stipulate the story of their Le Corsaire ballet. Equally, who actually is aware of what’s occurring on this virtually plot-less model of The Nutcracker with its Act I Stalbaums’s Christmas occasion and Act II divertissements within the Sugar Backyard of the Kingdom of Sweets; other than that it gives – for all of the differing casts in any revival – a glittery and snowy showcase for your entire firm, in addition to college students of The Royal Ballet Faculty.
As soon as extra I can solely consult with Wright’s personal synopsis: ‘The depraved Queen of the Mice solid a spell over Drosselmeyer’s nephew, Hans-Peter, which remodeled him into an unpleasant Nutcracker Doll. The one strategy to break the spell was for the Nutcracker to defeat the Mouse King, thereby committing an act of nice bravery, and for a younger lady to like and take care of him regardless of his terrible look.’ And that’s principally it, although – as I’ve written earlier than – Hoffmann’s authentic The Nutcracker and the Mouse King is far darker and open to reinterpretation; probably because the stuff of nightmares, or in a Freudian means, as for instance, the psychoanalytic dimension Rudolf Nureyev delivered to his Nutcracker (evaluate right here).
Julia Trevelyan Oman’s designs for this Nutcracker take us to the Christmas occasion in ye olde Nuremberg in these far-off days when kids have been nonetheless allowed to be kids. There’s a contact of anarchy to the twee domesticity when the St Nicholas Eve parade invades the home. Drosselmeyer is on the centre of every little thing which occurs on the occasion; from entertaining the visitors along with his magic methods, to making an attempt to orchestrate the rescue of his nephew from his destiny because the Nutcracker. The Christmas tree grows to a stunning peak, as Drosselmeyer attracts Clara – shrunk Alice-like – into her surreal, dreamlike adventures. She battles sinister toys and evil mice, vanquishes the Mouse King (beating him over the top with one in every of her slippers) and thus proves her bravery and love for the Nutcracker she has rescued, and this enables Clara to develop up. The forces of fine, Drosselmeyer and the Christmas Angel he made, conjure up falling snowflakes and the transporting of Clara and the Nutcracker from the Land of Snow to the Kingdom of Sweets – which was the cake on the occasion – and all of the set-piece choreographic treats we’ve got been eagerly awaiting.
French-Italian Charlotte Politi – at the moment the Fixed Lambert Conducting Fellow with The Royal Ballet and Birmingham Royal Ballet – performed a really youthful account of a few of Tchaikovsky’s most vivid and luxurious music; that, nonetheless splendidly it was performed by the wonderful Orchestra of the Royal Opera Home, rushed headlong via the ballet. Too many important moments simply flashed by and sometimes the dancers seemed just a little rushed of their footwork (particularly in Peter Jones’s impeccable close-up camerawork for the cinema).
James Hay is a brand new Drosselmeyer and as a dancer he has been performing on this manufacturing for 25 years because the age of 11. Hay has been a toy soldier, Fritz, cavalier and Hans-Peter/Nutcracker. Now Hay was the arch-manipulator Drosselmeyer who was much less avuncular than some, and – to be trustworthy – appeared barely demonic and a whirling dervish who seemed as if he was second cousin to Von Rothbart in Swan Lake.
Marianna Tsembenhoi – an rising expertise to maintain an in depth eye on – was an enticing Clara with completely pure, fleet-footed motion as she skipped via the story with a completely plausible sense of marvel: as if genuinely experiencing every little thing for the very first time, particularly the falling snow and the prepubescent stirrings of affection. As Hans-Peter/Nutcracker Taisuke Nakao was extra of a clean canvas as an actor however a really thrilling spring-heeled dancer and delicate companion.
The Nutcracker has a number of solo roles and requirements and vitality ranges have been very excessive all through the efficiency: notably within the second act when Tsembenhoi and Nakao inveigle themselves all through the divertissements. Nadia Mullova-Barley and Harris Bell have been notably slinky in Gary Avis’s revised Arabian Dance, even when the Chinese language Dance (the athletic Martin Diaz and Harrison Lee) is trying more and more anachronistic. The corps de ballet have been in notably scintillating type for the Waltz of the Snowflakes, arching and swaying with their fingers fluttering to imitate falling flakes. At a sure level within the music, snow does descend accompanied by the atmospherically otherworldly singing of the London Oratory Junior Choir and The Schola Cantorum of the London Oratory Faculty offstage. The corps de ballet additionally shone within the Waltz of the Flowers with Claire Calvert as a aromatic Rose Fairy.
Lastly, it was time for the Sugar Plum Fairy and her Prince’s pas de deux and there was no doubting the technical perfection of the refined Mayara Magri and the stiff-backed Reece Clarke who towered over her because the stalwart Prince. Magri was all smiley grace and musicality while Reece’s dancing was tidy, although – for me – lacked some élan and charisma.
So, this field office-winner of a Nutcracker has handed forty and I think it would return once more subsequent Christmas since The Royal Ballet’s perspective stays ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t repair it’.
Jim Pritchard
Featured Picture: Mayara Magri (Sugar Plum Fairy) and Reece Clarke (Prince) © Andrej Uspenski
Creatives:
Music – Pyotr Il’yich Tchaikovsky
Choreography – Peter Wright after Lev Ivanov
State of affairs – Marius Petipa after E.T.A. Hoffmann
Manufacturing and State of affairs – Peter Wright
Designer – Julia Trevelyan Oman
Lighting designer – Mark Henderson
Manufacturing Marketing consultant – Roland John Wiley
Staging – Christopher Carr, Samantha Raine
Arabian Dance tailored by Gary Avis
Forged included:
The Sugar Plum Fairy – Mayara Magri
The Prince – Reece Clarke
Herr Drosselmeyer – James Hay
Clara – Marianna Tsembenhoi
Hans-Peter/The Nutcracker – Taisuke Nakao
Drosselmeyer’s assistant – Caspar Lench
Dr Stahlbaum – Thomas Whitehead
Mrs Stahlbaum = Christina Arestis
Captain – Téo Dubreuil
Harlequin – Marco Masciari
Columbine – Mica Bradbury
Soldier – Harrison Lee
Mouse King – Francisco Serrano
Spanish Dance – Isabel Lubach, Olivia Findlay, Maddison Pritchard, Giacomo Rovero, James Massive, Blake Smith
Arabian dance – Nadia Mullova-Barley, Harris Bell
Chinese language dance – Martin Diaz, Harrison Lee
Russian Dance – Francisco Serrano, Joshua Junker
Dance of the Mirlitons – Ella Newton Severgnini, Viola Pantuso, Amelia Townsend, Yu Dangle
Rose Fairy – Claire Calvert
Rose Fairy Escorts – Leo Dixon, Téo Dubreuil, Aiden O’Brien, Joonhyuk Jun
Main Flowers – Mica Bradbury, Hannah Grennell, Chisato Katsura, Charlotte Tonkinson
