The ticket fairy flew by and dropped an invitation in my lap, so I got to see the English National Ballet's 'The Nutcracker' last night and it was worth it for the last six minutes alone. Helicopter view first. When the opening curtains parted the set was dripping in richness, luxury and elegance, and this continued with every set change throughout the performance. The art of set designing has improved beyond description since my theatre days in London. If like me for quite some, you haven't been to the theatre, I urge you to try again. It's so much more immersive.
The first act caught me by surprise, there were about 25 ballet dancing children as the mice or skating soldiers, and they were really good, I didn't see a single mistake. How do they get all those children off school and performing around the country? All of them transformed into real mice at one point with collective fingers waggling like the whiskers and paws twitching as mice eat. However I was anticipating the grown ups to take over and to be candid, I didn't see the kind of performance I was expecting. Now, it might have been the view I had or the excessively hot theatre, or even the version being watched, but the only performance worth noting was the lead female dancer. I believe her name is Fernanda Oliveira from Brazil. Where Yijing Zhang of Birmingham Royal Ballet was magnetically tall, Fernanda's Sugar Plum fairy was diminutively hypnotic. Precision, levitation and elegant symmetry all rolled into one. Superb stuff.
The second act was closer to my expectations. More Corp de Ballet, more Batterie and an astonishing Coda. I think it says more about me than anything but I don't understand why Swan Lake, not The Nutcracker is most popular in the United States. I've also come to the conclusion that if there's no orchestra I'm not going to attend. The richness of sound, in this case the ENB Philharmonic, is something no sound system can come close to. When I went to see Matthew Bourne's Sleeping Beauty earlier this year I didn't write it up as I thought it was crap for various reasons but more expensive tickets and no Philharmonic Orchestra will suffice. Anyway, the wrap up Coda of ENB's The Nutcracker was a dazzlingly baroque, twisting Rubik's Cube of light, shadow and writhing bodies, internally-externalising with the mechanism and precision of a watch. I'll add close examples to the post below. It was worth every penny just for that and I left delighted.
