The Nutcracker (TV Movie 1. I have said many times that The Nutcracker is one of my all- time favourites. And this is one of my favourite productions alongside the later Royal Ballet production, Kirov and Baryschnikov productions. Bolshoi has its flaws but is also very good. In fact the only one I disliked was the Bejart production.
This production from 1. The settings especially in Act 2 really give a timeless festive feel that the ballet and story should have and the costumes and lighting are equally simple but colourful. Tchaikovsky's music is phenomenal, one of the all- time great ballet scores and one of his best overall scores. The orchestral playing, which is full of lushness and power and conducting, which is both authoritative and nuanced, do the score justice.
With Lesley Collier, Anthony Dowell. Although the set design and most of the costumes are remarkably like the later Royal Ballet Peter Wright productions. The Nutcracker (TV Movie 1985). The Birmingham Royal Ballet Peter Wright's Production of The Nutcracker. Music: Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky Choreography: Peter Wright, Lev Ivanov, Vincent Redmon Conductor: Barry Wordsworth. I received this video from my Grandfather for Christmas several years ago and absolutely love it. I watch it every Christmas along with many other versions of the Nutcracker. Anthony Dowell and Lesley Collier are a sheer. Royal Ballet, Covent Garden; Lesley Collier, Anthony Dowell, Michael Coleman. Peter Wright's production of The Nutcracker, Tchaikovsky.
The choreography is splendid, all the moves and lines are flowing and look easy when they're not and it is in perfect sync with the music. The Grand Pas De Deux and Dance of the Snowflakes were especially well done, as well as the speciality numbers in the Land of Sweets. The scene with the Mice is thrilling, frightening and not too cluttered, and the early scenes at the party makes it feel like it's Christmas no matter when in the year and how many times you see it. The dancing itself is just as good, Lesley Collier is especially good as the Sugar Plum Fairy with effortless lines and commanding grace.
Anthony Dowell is masculine and handsome as the Prince should be, while Julia Hope is a charming Clara and Guy Nibblet's Nutcracker appropriately valiant. Jonathan Cope is sinister as the Mouse King and his Arabian dance has an almost seductive element to it. Michael Coleman is perfect as Drosselmeyer. Overall, simply gorgeous.
List of productions of The Nutcracker. Although the original 1. Marius Petipa production was not a success, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ballet The Nutcracker began to slowly enjoy worldwide popularity after Balanchine first staged his production of it in 1. An abridged version of the ballet, performed by the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo, was staged in New York City in 1.
Alexandra Fedorova. Since Vasili Vainonen's 1. Russia, and Balanchine's 1. New York City Ballet production, many other choreographers have made their own versions.
The Nutcracker (Royal Ballet Covent Garden) (1985). Covent Garden in London and stars the fabulous Anthony Dowell as the Prince, Lesley Collier as the Sugar Plum. Peter Wright's Production Of The Nutcracker - The Royal Ballet Covent Garden. The Royal Ballet Covent Garden captures all the fantasy and magic of one of the world's most. Lesley Collier, Anthony Dowell : Condition. Lesley Collier & Anthony Dowell. Natalia Makorova & Anthony Dowell. The Royal Ballet, Covent Garden. Tchaikovsky: The Nutcracker.
Some institute the changes made by Gorsky and Vainonen respectively while others, like Balanchine, utilize the original libretto. Some notable productions include those by Rudolf Nureyev for the Royal Ballet, Yuri Grigorovich for the Bolshoi Ballet, Mikhail Baryshnikov for the American Ballet Theatre, and Peter Wright for the Royal Ballet and the Birmingham Royal Ballet. In recent years, revisionist productions, including those by Mark Morris, Matthew Bourne, and Mikhail Chemiakin have appeared, which depart radically from both the original 1. Gorsky's revival. In addition to annual live stagings of the work, many productions have also been televised and/or released on home video.
Hoffmann, which is now the source material for various animated and live action films. Tchaikovsky's music, especially The Nutcracker Suite, a selection of eight pieces from the complete score, has become extremely popular. The suite (sans the Miniature Overture and the March) was featured in the popular Disney film Fantasia. The Snow Queen/King would later be featured in some subsequent productions, including Helgi Tomasson's for the San Francisco Ballet. Alexander Gorsky (1.
Vainonen followed Gorsky in departing from the original 1. Clara (called Masha in this production) and the Prince, having them perform the second act Grand Pas de Deux originally intended for the Sugar Plum Fairy and her Cavalier (who are omitted from the production altogether), augmenting the role of Drosselmeyer, and concluding the ballet with Masha's realization that the fantasy sequences were a dream.
Many subsequent productions, including those by Nureyev and Baryshnikov, have adopted these changes. Petersburg (known as Leningrad during the Communist era) to commemorate the 1. In 1. 99. 4, with sets and costumes first used in its 1.
Vainonen version was staged again, starring Larissa Lezhnina as Masha, Victor Baranov as the Nutcracker / Prince, and Piotr Russanov as Drosselmeyer. This revival was videotaped and released on DVD.
Both of them were familiar with the 1. Balanchine described the Maryinsky production: how the big doors opened on the tree, the mime of Drosselmeyer, all the details.
At one point, Danilova started dancing Clara's variation, in her stocking feet and street dress. Balanchine put an end to that with his admonishment, 'No, no, Alexandra, don't try to show him the actual steps.
Let him create his own choreography.' We worked all night, and that is how I got my first Nutcracker.. I never intended it to become an annual production, but there you are, it is a tradition now! Perhaps choreographers will make up for lost time from now on. The company has performed The Nutcracker annually in subsequent versions by Lew Christensen and Helgi Tomasson respectively. On New Year's Day, 1. ABC- TV telecast a one- hour abridgment of Lew Christensen's 1. Cynthia Gregory danced the role of the Sugar Plum Fairy and dancer Terry Orr was the Snow King.
Of course, this was not always so. We used to rely on a touring company to give us a truncated version of this full- length work, a ballet people used to call Nutcracker Suite because people knew the music better than the ballet. Now all that is different.. I have liked this ballet from the first time I danced in it as a boy when I did small roles in the Maryinsky Theatre production. When I was fifteen, I danced the Nutcracker Prince. Years later in New York, when our company decided to do an evening- long ballet, I preferred to turn to The Nutcracker, with which American audiences were not sufficiently familiar. I accordingly went back to the original score, restored cuts that had been made, and in the development of the story chose to use the original E.
T. A. Hoffmann, although keeping the outlines of the dances as given at the Maryinsky. A prologue was added and the dances restaged. Balanchine made some musical edits for his production, adding an entr'acte originally composed for Act II of The Sleeping Beauty (used as a transition between the departure of the guests and the battle with the mice in Act I), moving the Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy to earlier in Act II, and excising the Tarantella variation intended for the Cavalier during the Grand Pas de Deux.
Balanchine also departed from the original production on some points. For instance, while in the original production the Waltz of the Flowers was performed by eighteen male- female couples, Balanchine utilized a group of fourteen female dancers led by a Dew Drop soloist. For instance, Balanchine used Hoffmann's original name for the heroine, Marie Stahlbaum (rather than Clara Silberhaus as in the 1. Drosselmeyer who appears in the party scene and later as the Nutcracker Prince.
It enjoyed huge popularity in New York and has been performed by the New York City Ballet every year since its premiere. Annual performances now take place at the David H. Koch Theater at Lincoln Center. This version has been broadcast three times on live television - first, in an abridged form in 1. CBS on the TV anthology Seven Lively Arts.
CBS's Playhouse 9. Balanchine Nutcracker, narrated by actress June Lockhart, who was then starring as the mother in CBS's Lassie, in 1. Nutcracker broadcast in color. It was PBS's first- ever telecast of the Balanchine Nutcracker. The Atlanta PBS stations, for instance, substituted self- help specials from Suze Orman and others, as they often do now during their pledge drives. This 2. 01. 1 telecast of The Nutcracker has so far not appeared complete online, and has not been released on DVD because Live from Lincoln Center customarily refuses to release its programs on video, due to difficulties involving paying royalties to the various parties involved.
This production was nominated for an Emmy Award. Nureyev had previously performed the role of the Nutcracker Prince in Vainonen's version as a student at the Leningrad Ballet school in February 1. As far as is known, it has never been telecast on U.
S. Nureyev played the roles of Drosselmeyer and the Nutcracker Prince, while Wayne Sleep portrayed the Nutcracker. Some critics considered this a Freudian touch, taking it to mean that it is not the Nutcracker who turns into a Prince, but Drosselmeyer. However, this is not necessarily obvious to viewers of the DVD of this production. And, as in the Vainonen version, much of the company also dances along with Maria and the Prince as they perform the Adagio in the Act II Pas de Deux; in fact, Maria and the Prince never have the stage all alone to themselves. As a departure from the original 1. Grigorovich omits the pantomime that the Prince performs . The music for the pantomime is used for the defeat of the Mouse King, who is not killed in the first act as in the original or Vainonen's version, but at the beginning of the second act.
In this production, although Maria (or Clara) is outfitted with a bridal veil in the Final Waltz in anticipation to her impending wedding to the Nutcracker Prince, she then awakens to find that the fantasy sequences were a dream. This version was first televised in the New York area only by WNBC- TV in 1. CBS first telecast the famous Baryshnikov version. First Lady Betty Ford hosted, and the telecast was unique because the lead dancers had to be replaced halfway through due to injuries. A revival of it was recorded on video in 1.
Bolshoi production, husband- and- wife team Ekaterina Maximova as Maria and Vladimir Vasiliev as the Nutcracker Prince. Another revival of this version was recorded in 1. Natalya Arkhipova as Clara, not Maria as in the earlier version, and Irek Mukhamedov as the Nutcracker Prince (but not the Nutcracker himself; that role is played by a female dancer, Marisa Okothnikova). In this revival the romance between Clara and the Prince is slightly more pronounced than in the earlier Bolshoi version. The entire score is used, which means that the Dance of the Clowns, cut from the earlier version, is reinstated, though Mother Ginger does not appear, nor do any clowns; the dance is performed by the same dancers who perform the other divertissements. It is now available on DVD, and has been telecast in the U.
S. The use of the new technique afforded moviegoers the chance to see the production in more vivid colors than had been featured in the earlier versions of the production, especially since the Bolshoi Theatre had been recently renovated. Nina Kaptsova starred as Marie (rather than Clara) and Artem Ovcharenko was the Nutcracker Prince. Other changes included having a drunken guest at the Christmas party be the one responsible for breaking the Nutcracker, not Clara's brother Fritz, who is portrayed fairly sympathetically in this version. Clara, meanwhile, does not throw her slipper at the Mouse King during the battle, but a candleholder instead. In order to provide a dramatic climax to the story, the adagio was made the penultimate dance in the ballet, coming just before the Final Waltz and Apotheosis. This production achieved particular popularity when it was recorded for television in 1.
Gelsey Kirkland as Clara (one of her few roles captured on video), with Baryshnikov and Minz reprising their roles as the Nutcracker / Prince and Drosselmeyer respectively. The telecast was directed by multi- Emmy- winning choreographer and director Tony Charmoli.