Ballet West: The Nutcracker

Ballet West’s The Nutcracker is the first and longest-running full-length version of the ballet in the United States, created by company founder Willam Christensen in 1944 for the San Francisco Ballet. Legacy still features heavily in decisions made regarding the production and how it is marketed, and the continuity of the popular holiday classic is a point of pride for Ballet West (yet also somewhat of a sticking point). A costly overhaul of the production’s sets and costumes premiered last season with the firm reassurance that the choreography would go unchanged, and the resulting renovation has been well-received.

Tradition and historical precedent are often inescapable factors in the presentation of classical art forms. However, while familiarity and tradition may draw crowds to The Nutcracker whose sizes far surpass those at other productions, changes may be necessary to support the ballet’s continuation. In Ballet West’s production, a dramatic and deeply necessary alteration of the Chinese divertissement was made in 2013, although it was more cagily framed at the time and lacked clarity as to the nature of the need for change. Through the lens of 2018, however, the new Chinese dance is now just one on a wonderful and growing list of alterations made explicitly to end racial stereotypes in ballet. The Nutcracker, a major source of revenue for Ballet West and most ballet (and other) companies, provides the greatest visibility and exposure for an art form that struggles to be current and accessible. This means that the manner in which The Nutcracker represents ballet is even more critical.

The overture to Tchaikovsky’s suite creates an immediate wave of nostalgia the moment it begins. After a pleasant duration, lighting effects new to the 2017 version tastefully transitioned the audience into the theater experience by slowly and perfectly illuminating each of three ornaments depicting dancers that adorned the curtain. The matinee I attended was full of families with young children, who were audibly delighted by this display. Following the curtain’s rise, three successive orders of scale (the snowy town outside Dr. Drosselmeyer’s shop, the street outside the Stahlbaums’ manor, and the Stahlbaums’ front hall) were cleared before Act I began in earnest within the Stahlbaums’ home. As might be said of the entire first act, this felt somewhat tedious, but elements of traditional stagecraft helped relieve the protracted score. Additionally, a great degree of the charm throughout the first act’s party scene was imparted by the impressively well-rehearsed cast of children.

The endless social dances and toy-laden whirling were punctuated throughout the party scene by the convincingly precise and thoughtfully costumed Doll, danced by Kimberly Ballard, and the bombastic presence of Dr. Drosselmeyer. Drosselmeyer, portrayed by Trevor Naumann, was all sweeping iconic pantomime, sight gags, and emotive displays and his presence is critical to the enlivenment of Act I. Rather than the mysterious creepy uncle found in almost every other Nutcracker, Christensen’s flamboyant Drosselmeyer reminds me of the classic trope of the Eccentric Mentor. However, no amount of actorly interpretation could make his cape-swirling, clock-inhabiting presence less than sinister as a sleeping Clara begins to dream the battle scene. The Christmas tree grew in a very effective swirl of light, the battle ended after many alternations between cowering and saber-rattling, and Clara and the now life-size Nutcracker Prince were whisked off to take in the snow scene. The corps de ballet of Snowflakes was sharp, though anyone seated anywhere off center would have missed much of the clarity in their formations. The pas de deux was the first refreshing moment in the ballet to watch less than a full cast’s worth of dancers on stage and was a nice bit of classical partnering in its own right.

Following intermission, through some charming old-school puppetry, Clara and her escort arrived in the land of the Sugar Plum Fairy. The backdrop included an array of iconic world architectures, a kind of visual esperanto that brands universal goodwill. The intention was sweet but naively relativistic, the result troubling as ever given how these cultures are represented later in the second act. The welcoming Pages, danced by students of the Ballet West Academy, were amazing; they executed sequential double pirouettes and grand allegro jumps with confidence and skill. Their counterparts in the Ladies-in-Waiting were disappointingly mere stage-dressing, and overdressed at that, bearing cumbersome decorative staves and overwrought headdresses. All of which was very Old-World European in aspect… until the arrival of the costumed monkeys, dressed in fezzes and vests, who were cast-listed as “Servants” and whose mode of movement was a too-familiar servile, half-bowing trot. Act II had just begun and already I found myself questioning this young German girl’s grasp of the nuances of the Global Village and its neocolonial entanglements, herself and her worldly reverie poised on the cusp of the Second Industrial Revolution.

The entrance of the Sugar Plum Fairy was dramatic, a vision of beauty, strength, and composure. I could have done without the butterfly wings affixed temporarily to her back, but I could also see how the kids in the audience might have enjoyed them. Emily Adams was completely stunning in her Sugar Plum variation, articulating every inch of the iconic solo and the final pas de deux. The series of divertissements that preceded her were largely enjoyable. The Spanish divertissement was a fun and lively trio, the Mirlitons found ease in a technical ensemble, and the Russian dance was both crowd-pleasing and reflective of a folk dance tradition. The Waltz of the Flowers was busy yet lovely, and I would gladly watch Katherine Lawrence as the lead flower do beautiful battement battu down the diagonal at the expense of the many pressed high lifts, which were less exciting than her incredible execution.

Mother Buffoon was a delightfully overblown archetype of the “pantomime dame,” in the music hall mimesis drag tradition. I think more could be done with the role to honor that tradition, as was achieved so well in last season’s production of Sir Frederick Ashton’s Cinderella. Mother Buffoon’s divergent torso and borrowed pair of legs make for fantastic vaudeville and are great technical costuming at that. The tiny bumblebees’ costumes looked rather cheap in comparison, and it is anyone’s guess as to why they are in and out of her skirts, but there exists both historical and local precedent: the 1892 premiere of Petipa and Ivanov’s Nutcracker ended with a hive of dancing bees, and Christensen’s production now lives on in the Beehive State. The bees are also super cute.

The Chinese and Arabian dances were more troublesome than enjoyable for me. The Chinese dance formerly exemplified racist caricature and now, following its 2013 reworking, is a skillful display with an element of cultural celebration. The alteration was deeply necessary and I am appreciative of Artistic Director Adam Sklute’s initiative in making the change. I also appreciate his commentary on it, which appears in the Final Bow For Yellowface, an initiative spearheaded by the incredible New York City Ballet soloist and “rogue ballerina” Georgina Pazcoguin. The new Chinese Warrior dance was imported from an old San Francisco Ballet version, choreographed by Willam Christensen’s brother Lew, and thus historically tied to Ballet West’s production. However, despite this retroactive commitment to end yellowface, we saw quite a bit of it still in Ballet West’s performance of Stanton Welch’s Madame Butterfly in 2016.

I am concerned that, without a similar such alternative, the Arabian Dance will not get the reworking that it too absolutely needs. The admission that many of the divertissements are caricature and stereotype, but to varying degrees of insult, is worrisome. The Arabian dance includes the same sexist servility found in the former Chinese dance, with the Arabian female lead also utterly sexualized and exoticized, flailing her arms and gyrating in a way that is needlessly outside of keeping with the rest of the dance and utterly divergent from any national or ethnic folk dance tradition. Ballet West has recently exemplified commitment to representing diversity in ballet, supporting female choreographers, and engaging in cultural ambassadorship as a touring company. I am grateful to support a company that actively progresses ballet in the twenty-first century. I hope I can count on Ballet West to do no less than excise the remaining blithe racism in their historical production of The Nutcracker.

Nora Price is a Milwaukee native living and working in Salt Lake City. She can be seen performing with Municipal Ballet Co. and with Durian Durian, an art band that combines post-punk music and contemporary dance.

Glimpse 4: Contact Improvisation Event

Glimpse 4 was a practice in observing a process. A culmination of a 10-day research practice, it provided the opportunity for attendees to participate in the Underscore, an improvisation score developed by Nancy Stark Smith, one of the founding participants of Contact Improvisation.

Even though the audience, seated in a circle around the studio, did not actively move or participate, its existence in the space functioned as participation: the Underscore, practiced globally, is not traditionally observed outside of active participation, so observing the improvisational score became just as participatory as actively moving within it.

Aside from the Underscore I attended, Glimpse 4 also included two community Underscores and a Contact Improvisation jam. Two evenings of the Underscore were presented for observers, but, fittingly, culminated in a completely participatory one. The events were produced by Leah DelPorto and Brandin Steffensen, with remote direction by Nancy Stark Smith. The performers were Katherine Cook, Anne Cooper, Scott Davis, Leah DelPorto, Elise Knudson, Rachael Lincoln, Brandin Steffensen, Anne-Gaëlle Thiriot, and Ronja Ver.

The evening began by attendees entering a studio at Performing Dance Center, with chairs and cushions arranged in a circle, a table of snacks and beverages, a station for artwork, drawing, and reflection, and dancers mingling. From the beginning, everything felt authentic, like the attendees were each active members of the improvisers’ community. Conversations were not forced in a performative sense, but the dancers genuinely engaged everyone they spoke with. Attendees were invited to move around the periphery of the studio, with a specific directive to not enter the dancing space, but to still be involved. After an introduction typical of an improv jam (sharing names, pronouns, and physical limitations, including those of both the dancers and the attendees), the Underscore began.

I entered Glimpse 4 aware of the Underscore, but lacking previous experience practicing it. While I observed multiple steps throughout, it was remarkable to note how cohesive the evening felt. Cues were taken internally and from the other performers, both physically (such as Scott Davis sprinting across the room, the other dancers immediately following) and verbally (Ronja Ver articulating that three duets were happening to catch the other performers’ attention).

While the movement and score were both intriguing, most interesting to me was taking stock of my own experience. Yes, I was an observer, but the experience was designed so that everyone in the studio was equally involved, whether they were moving or not. As a movement practitioner, I experienced a number of sensations: frustration at not being able to join the full movement experience, pleasure when I contributed to the architecture of the score, surprise at noticing unexpected relationships develop, and even contentment at being purely an observer.

Due to some variables, I was unable to observe the entirety of the Underscore, so my experience feels unresolved. As such, I welcome further thoughts on resolution and reflections that I will unfortunately not be able to offer here. I wish I had been able to participate in the entire evening, both because I felt disruptive in creating an absence - which speaks to how well the evening created a community in the space - and because I wished to hear the dancers’ perspectives on being observed during a traditionally unobserved experience.

Natalie Gotter is a performer, choreographer, instructor, filmmaker, and researcher. She recently completed her MFA in Modern Dance at the University of Utah and is on faculty at Utah Valley University, Westminster College, and Salt Lake Community College.

Dat Nguyen: Will the Sheep Come to be Cleaned?

First, there was lip-syncing to a Christina Aguilera song. Then the first dancer skated on stage, her gushing snarl followed on its heels by a riotous chorus of five others, all smizing in provocative black underthings and gyrating madly. The slinky, goofy burlesque of this brief scene wasn’t anything like what followed it, or much of anything after that. But throwing a few hints and conjuring the wild and weird spectacle of the kingdom of pop culture built on the joy found in watching people pretend to sing was a pretty good place to begin Dat Nguyen’s Will the Sheep Come to be Cleaned? The new work, presented at Sugar Space Arts Warehouse, was a raucously fragmentary and finely tuned pinball game of emotional complexity and spectacle.

With an approach based on the chopping, blending, obfuscation, and scrupulous arrangement and rearrangement of visual collages, Nguyen ricocheted between nearly a dozen wildly diverse and splintered stories, both masterfully and delightfully. Citing his own feverishly overstuffed brain intersecting with anxiety, depression, and life in a culture that jerks us from one disorienting and performatively manipulative spectacle to another at lightning speeds, Nguyen explained that his work was meant to be a multi-dimensional experience and deeply personal reflection of his multi-layered self. These refractions eschewed narrative but were richly infused with distinctly-felt character and setting, transmitted to the audience through dance but also through music, words, monologues, photography, sculpted visuals, and technology.

Following the flash of the overture, the show pivoted to a monologue by Emma Sargent, explaining a time she danced for a very “Jesus-y” company. While she told us how many times a day they prayed and about her clashes with the director over Gaga, the others roamed about, rotating through slow-drifting weight-sharing exercises. With deft comedic timing, her voice cut out at key moments. This culminated in a bit that had the audience rolling in their seats in which she mimed a tirade given by her director, the silence punctuated only by an intermittent “...Gaga…..Gaga….Ohad Naharin...Gaga…” as the dancers in the background exploded, flailing in mocking mimicry.

From there we bounced to a third segment, and one of my favorites – a duet between Nguyen and Nora Lang. I’d seen a working version of this section at Mudson earlier in the fall which I loved; it was even more breathlessly moving to watch it here. This movement focused on a more physical energy than previous sections, with a kinesthetic intimacy developing between their two bodies in swift and unending motion. Paired with sounds of rain and splashing, lapping waves layered under the circling carousel of a waltz as Nguyen and Lang moved in sync. Their bodies became cresting and crashing waves that turned back again into bodies as they came up against each other, fluid and spilling over the edges of themselves. The choreography was aerobic and sweeping yet riddled with small clever delights.

Interrupting this couple, Emma Wilson appeared carrying a large roll of what looked like shiny silver wrapping paper. The light shifted to cool blue as they took over the space and began speaking while rolling out the paper across the length of the stage, going through a halting cyclical reasoning about “purpose in life” that didn’t seem to get them where they wanted to go. The water couple did the sheep shuffle down the silver path – wait, sorry… let me back up and explain.

All the different expressions of Will the Sheep Come to be Cleaned? were abstract and unconnected, without an overarching narrative. But they did form what felt like a story, packaged neatly together by layered and excellent transitions, recurrent patterns, and of course, the sheep. Afterwards, during a Q & A, Nguyen explained how he borrowed from a moment in an earlier work to create the title expressly for a grant application. From there he applied his process of collage and brought ideas and emotions to the studio to explore and improvise upon. Nguyen noted that in creating his work, the integrity of its personal meaning was most important to him, as well as the process with his dancers. But he also touched upon (both in the Q & A and in press material, including an interview with Salt Lake City Weekly) finding a way to thread his many ideas together and creating an engaging experience for an audience, and how that is... well, kind of the point of sharing it with people, and the more interesting artistic challenge.

Nguyen was successful in not compromising the integrity of his clouded, shifting creation, which was explicitly designed to avoid straightforward articulation. And he found a way to select the arrangement of his collage and add subtle motifs to impose a loose conceptual through-line for the purposes of securing time and space to create work and appeasing an audience. It was incredibly satisfying and exciting to watch this done so masterfully and, as a very jumbled-up artist myself, I will probably carry it around with me for a long time.

Which bring us back to the sheep. Throughout the show, one of the devices used to pull it together involved the dancers bending over to grab their ankles and doing a little hoof-like scuffle around in a flock. A sheep shuffle. It looked as silly as it sounds and was so simple that it shouldn’t have worked. But it was so funny and perfectly effective at tying the far-flung emotional spectrum of the show together.

So, the sheep shuffled off, and the light plunged to a deep blue. The vocal track of a drill sergeant came on, or maybe it was an overzealous fitness bootcamp instructor, and Wilson performed a few casual feats of superhuman strength and agility. Rolling, bending, beating, and twisting their body, they propelled it in every direction with a force and control that sparked both a viscera-deep emotional as well as blood-racing somatic reaction. The dance was punctuated by their grin, at times equally sheepish and wolfish. They ended the solo by rolling themselves up in the wrapping paper to rest, a shining silver lump.  

Each part of Will the Sheep Come to be Cleaned? was meaningful and densely layered. It’s hard to give a short summation of what was important, because it all felt important. And at this point there was still a huge range of things to come: a girl wearing a pink sweater decorated with tiny sheep who read from her cell phone a technical description of how and why and to what standard sheep are to be cleaned for slaughter; the Emma sheep, who lost their footing and spiraled into violent Gaga-esque spasms; a pair that danced a series of slow, stilted gestures to the melodramatic power pop, disco frenzy of ABBA; a fake ending that fooled everyone; the return of the water couple, who swayed cheek to cheek before falling out of sync. There was a woman who instructed a fitness class by talking about pet ownership and death and her apathy towards her grandmother. The pinkest sheep waltzed back in and began a glassy-eyed, floating dance to “Ave Maria” while the lighting turned dramatically baroque and the others Army-crawled around her. She picked up the silver wrapping and vogued with it before tossing it over the group, who gathered together and moved out, writhing in the shadows.

A shoutout belongs here for the great lighting and technical direction by Peter Larsen. The Sugar Space stage is small and bare, with a seating arrangement close to the action - it can make or break a show depending on how its elements are handled. The design and direction throughout were excellent: no element, not even floor work, was lost and the complex production moved seamlessly.

The final scene was heralded by the chime of an echoing clock tower. The ringing turned into a mechanical tick-tock and the dancers fell into a walking pattern that somehow conveyed “nursery-rhyme-crossed-with-dystopian-slaughterhouse-conveyor-belt,” traversing right and left in pairs, intermittently breaking the pattern. A harsh mechanical scream stopped them and the light blinked to sickly chemical green. Headbanging forcibly before reversing the movement, they ended by throwing their heads back, necks exposed, in a slow, deep arch backwards. Returning upright, they coalesced and heaved Nora Lang onto their backs, her limbs and eyes splayed wildly. They dumped her, then she Army-crawled to the edge of the stage, throwing back a curtain as the clock struck again to reveal a galvanized silver tub. Pulling herself in and standing, she cast off her blouse and skirt to reveal the black lingerie that had been underneath since the beginning and began to pour water over herself, her face that of enraptured delight as the light faded.

Speaking with one of the dancers a few days later, they made a comment along the lines of, “It was so cool but also disorienting and odd to perform - we spent so long trying everything a million different ways.” Challenging the idea of narrative as we commonly conceive of it, maybe a collage is the closest way to tell the story of a life - everything all at once and following and preceding and repeating until it’s over, some of it real and raw while other parts get dried out or hidden. And that’s what it feels like, doesn’t it? Nothing makes sense when you’re in it.

Dat Nguyen’s Will the Sheep Come to be Cleaned? Photo by MotionVivid.

Emily Snow resides in Salt Lake City, where she performs regularly with Municipal Ballet Co. and with Durian Durian, an art band that combines post-punk music and contemporary dance.

Repertory Dance Theatre: Mosaic

Repertory Dance Theatre’s Mosaic was a curated evening that showcased the broad range of cultural communities in existence in the Salt Lake area: Polynesian, Native American, Spanish, Hispanic, African, Japanese, Cambodian, and Greek, as represented in the show. Mosaic was intended to comment upon how movement as a means of communication is universal across cultures. By additionally showcasing RDT performing snippets of its repertoire, Mosaic attempted to frame community-specific forms of dance and Western concert dance in the same way, equalizing them in terms of worth.

While this goal was achieved for me, the majority of RDT’s pieces felt extremely out of place in the concert. There is a difference between being inspired by a tradition, and preserving and developing movement traditions unique to an individual culture. Such was the case for Cutting the Sugar Cane by Ted Shawn: a piece inspired by the movement of Cuban workers, but not actually created for Cuban bodies. Additionally, the program made sure to point out Shawn’s interest in the “Far East,” a reminder of his predilection for Orientalism and the influence of stereotypes on Asian communities. As RDT’s pieces were the only ones showcasing this blending of movement from multiple cultures for a concert audience, it almost felt disrespectful to the other artists on the program.

The evening was split into six sections: Ceremonial Dances, Warrior Dances, Women’s Dances, Courtship Dances, Work Dances, and Community & Celebration Dances. Almost all of the groups performed multiple times, highlighting the presence of movement in each of these different cultures found across the globe. The guest performers included Ballet Folklorico de Las Americas, performing an enjoyable Mexican hat dance, among others; Dionysios Dance, which seemed to struggle to keep up the energy in their airborne Greek dances; Khemera Dance Troupe, which performed the intricacies of Cambodian dance; Okinawa Kenjinkai, which featured four older Japanese women who seemed to be enjoying themselves immensely; and Tablado Dance Company, featuring director Solange Gomes, performing a satisfying flamenco dance. Additionally, RDT performed a Guinean piece choreographed by Rosie Banchero that featured live drummers from WOFA Afro Fusion Dance.

NFR Dance Troupe and Malialole (a Native American and a Polynesian group, respectively) also performed in multiple pieces throughout the evening that were so high energy it felt remarkably uncomfortable to watch the piece in a dark theater in silence. These two groups prompted me to reflect upon we may perceive to belong in a concert dance venue, what we may perceive belongs elsewhere, and why we may hold those perceptions. I recognized that such internalized expectations might be exactly what RDT intended to address in Mosaic, but unfortunately that wasn’t explicitly shared.

Two events helped me examine the jarring dissonance I was feeling. During Mosaic, I was seated by the families of the youngest Polynesian dancers (three young girls who were probably five or six years old). Having been silent for the majority of the concert, the parents came alive and started clapping along and making joyous noises when their girls came out on stage. This reminded me that even though we may expect concert dance to be presented to and received by a silent audience, such rules may not be steadfast.

I then spoke with Banchero the next day about contemporary African dance, which reminded me that Native American dances now primarily take place in a competition setting - hence the plethora of colors and textures represented in the costumes. These dances may have originated for a cultural purpose, but the culture has since developed and changed. My expectation as an outsider was that the movement and the culture would remain as they always were, and in the past - which is not true of any culture.

Overall, Mosaic was an extremely enjoyable evening that even made me tearful at points. It was emotionally turbulent yet at the same time gratifying to inhabit a space with performers and communities who may dance for a different purpose than I do. I appreciate that RDT reached out to these communities and shared their voices with the concert dance-going community, and I am left with much to reflect upon as a result.

Photo of all performers in Repertory Dance Theatre’s Mosaic, courtesy of RDT.

Natalie Gotter is a performer, choreographer, instructor, filmmaker, and researcher. She recently completed her MFA in Modern Dance at the University of Utah and is on faculty at Utah Valley University, Westminster College, and Salt Lake Community College.

Gileadi Dance Co: Doyen

Drawing upon theatre, spoken word, and dance, Doyen, choreographed by Miriam Gileadi of Gileadi Dance Co, was an exploration of ritual, anonymity, animism, and groupthink. As performed by Tara Meredith, Deedee Moroz, Dmitri Peskov, Stanton Mercy Rodriguez, and Jake Winkelkotter, some of the most striking choreographic images emerged from unison and rhythmic structure as well as solo material, allowing the audience to be drawn in. Housed in the Eccles Theater Regent Street Black Box, Doyen took advantage of the theater’s superior sound system and lighting options, which unfortunately occasionally overshadowed the actual choreography.

The piece opened with five figures in silhouette, each embodying a hunched, swinging, and loose yet tense physicality. It was quickly revealed that all performers were wearing masks depicting the likenesses of different primates. The dancers wore the masks for the entire piece, concealing their identity as humans and placing themselves in an in-between realm in which animals were personified and humans were reminded of their origins. The masks themselves created tension, as physical movements often created emotions on the otherwise emotionless performers’ faces.

The strongest moments in Doyen were those featuring sharp unison - specifically, a repeated circular canon with a heavy bounce and look back at the audience. The circle truly allowed energy to be built up amongst the performers, to the point where the breakaway was never as satisfying as the build up.

Further strength came in several solo moments. While all of the performers had featured moments, Gileadi rightly chose to feature Meredith, Peskov, and Rodriguez most heavily. Meredith was a breakout performer, completely embodying the primal characterization and never seeming to falter in her energy. She moved expansively yet without tension, maintaining a sharpness with precision throughout the entire piece. Having not met Gileadi prior to the show, I wrongfully assumed that Meredith was the creator of the piece as the fullness of her performance was incomparable.

Peskov had some satisfying moments in his solo as well. He writhed on the floor with great fluidity and his constant return to standing, while never acknowledging the audience, was engaging. Initially, I was actually impatient watching his movement, yet the longer it went on, the more interested I became. At one point, he moved in unison with live musician Wachira Waigwa-Stone while the lights flickered, which engaged all of my senses in an extremely satisfying way.

Overall, Doyen was engaging at times, but difficult to maintain interest in at others. The majority of transitions between sections felt much too long, with seemingly improvised, unintentional movement as dancers waited for sound cues. That said, I was extremely impressed with the design of the show. The score was engaging and the lighting by Seth Mergist was appropriate in creating a mood yet never drawing full attention unless desired. One distraction, however, was the costuming. The dancers were dressed in all black, but it felt like the directive could have been “find the weirdest piece of black clothing in your closet,” and what might otherwise have been a polished look appeared as a mish-mash of mesh and fringe.

Overall, Doyen was an enjoyable experience and it is exciting to see what Gileadi and her company will present next. I appreciate her voice in the community, providing an intersection of dance and theater in a way that doesn’t seem to prioritize one over the other. I also greatly appreciate her aesthetic. In a dance world that is becoming increasingly fluid, her dynamism stood out in moments that made me want to get up and sweat with the performers.

Natalie Gotter is a performer, choreographer, instructor, filmmaker, and researcher. She recently completed her MFA in Modern Dance at the University of Utah and is on faculty at Utah Valley University, Westminster College, and Salt Lake Community College.