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By Rachel Straus<\/span><\/p>\n Nostalgia is the main event in most Nutcrackers. \u00a0But in the original 1892 \u201cNutcracker\u201d by Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov, the subject\u2014nostalgia for one’s lost childhood\u2014did little for the pre-Freudian audience. The libretto came from the 1816 novella by E. T. A. Hoffman. In it a girl’s favorite Christmas toy (the Nutcracker)\u00a0comes alive, defeats an evil Mouse King in battle, and whisks her away to a magical kingdom of toys. This plot wasn’t received enthusiastically by Russian audiences (primarily composed of the Tsar’s retinue), who were interested in getting their ballerina divertissements on.\u00a0And so the child-centric ballet faded from the repertoire.<\/p>\n In the mid 20th<\/sup> century more popular \u201cNutcracker\u201d productions developed, with the understanding that parents were sending their middle class daughters to ballet class. \u201cWouldn\u2019t it be nice to see Lauren in a ‘Nutcracker,’ dear?\u201d The rest is history. Most of these \u201cNutcracker\u201d ballets were made in America, during a time when culture still meant Europe. These versions referenced Victoriana or German volk and its concomitant bourgeois charms. In Act I everyone behaves beautifully. Consequently, the social interactions between the party guests and the perfectly dressed children have always looked stilted. We live in a culture which championed Doctor Spock. That is why Mark Morris\u2019s 1991 version\u2014called \u201cThe Hard Nut\u201d\u2014is a brilliant piece of theater. It traffics in social behaviors that we now refer to as the \u201cme\u201d generation. They are as familiar to us as the Big Mac is to many of our mouths.<\/p>\n On December 19 at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, \u201cThe Hard Nut\u201d had its last performance of the season. After 19 years in repertoire, it has never looked better. It is pitch perfect in its nostalgic waxing for\u2014and satirizing of\u2014suburbia, the sexual revolution, the Twist and the Hustle. (The Victorian waltz is nowhere to be found.) <\/span>American nostalgia, Morris brilliantly shows, has little to do with Europe or Russia. Our collective past is memorialized through bell-bottoms, big hair, and the Oprah-esque acknowledgement that all families have “issues”. In the \u201cHard Nut,\u201d memories of Christmas past include fake trees, the Yule log (blazing on TV), getting useless gifts, drinking spiked eggnog, and warding off lecherous maneuvers of drunken family friends. It also includes a nod to America’s role in slavery through the character of the black Nurse\/Maid. Kraig Patterson plays this role brilliantly. Auntie Maim in black pointe shoes? Check. <\/span>\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Using a truncated version of Tchaikovsky\u2019s score (performed by the 48-member MMDG Music Ensemble under Robert Cole\u2019s baton), the Morris Christmas ballet is a wonder for its visualization of the music. In the beginning of the Act II, the male-female ensemble leaps into the air as the cymbals crash. They are Snow. They sport headgear designed by Martin Pakledinaz that renders them into Dairy Queen soft serve cones. Every one is in a tutu. It\u2019s hard to tell gender. From their hands they throw flakes of powder. As their leaping increases, the snow sprays resemble fireworks bursting in air. It\u2019s delightful.<\/p>\n No prima ballerinas are in \u201cHard Nut.\u201d The star of the show is the costumes and the set design by cartoonist Charles Burns. In the magic kingdom of Act II, Burns created four gigantic portals, each one slighter smaller than the next, to frame the dance action on stage. The effect is a bit like Hitchcock\u2019s \u201cVertigo,\u201d especially when a huge bulls eye is lowered on the backdrop and it begins to spin. While Pakledinaz\u2019s costumes are over the top (the Mouse King is Elvis; the Arabian dancers are covered from head to toe according the principles of hijab), Burns\u2019 set is pared down and in black and white. When the giant Christmas tree appears, it moves into the space like a docking Art Deco style ocean liner. Act I may look like 1960s suburbia, but Act II definitely references 1920s glamour, a time in American culture where everything sped up, including the dances.<\/p>\n What is most miraculous about Morris\u2019s \u201cHard Nut\u201d is how loving it feels. While the choreographer\u2019s recent \u201cRomeo and Juliet\u201d (2007) fell flat (perhaps because Morris\u2019s stayed true to the plot and choreographed male-female dances), in \u201cHard Nut\u201d he completely dispenses with dancing along gender lines. John Heginbotham dances the role of Mrs. Stahlbaum\/the Queen across from Mark Morris who plays \u201cher\u201d husband. The first major pas de deux of the evening happens between two men: William Smith III (Drosselmeyer) and Heginbotham. In the finale, the heterosexual pas de deux between David Levanthal (Nutcracker) and Lauren Grant (Marie) also departs from convention. Other dancers lift them. Not once does Levanthal pick Grant up: ballet;s symbolic act for courtly love. Instead their love for each other is displayed in the last moments in the most obvious way: They kiss and kiss and kiss. Levanthal and Grant are married. From my vantage point, they appeared very happily married.<\/p>\n **<\/p>\n On December 18 at City Center, the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater held their 21st<\/sup> performance of their annual New York season. The program featured \u201cLove Stories\u201d (2004), \u201cSuite Otis,\u201d (1972), and \u201cRevelations\u201d (1960). The matinee performance began with a historical film in celebration of Ailey\u2019s masterwork, now in its 50th<\/sup> year in repertoire. The show was striking for two reasons. One, the newest crop of company dancers was featured. They include Daniel Harder, Demetia Hopkins, Megan Jakel, Yannick Lebrun, Michael Francis McBride, Samuel Lee Roberts, and Jermaine Terry. All of these dancers joined the company in the past two years. They are technically brilliant. I look forward to seeing them develop in their roles.<\/p>\n The other striking aspect of the show involved watching Vernard J. Gilmore in \u201cSuite Otis\u201d and \u201cRevelations.\u201d Gilmore joined the company in 1997. This year he has come into his own as an expressive, confident, charming, athletic, musical mover. In \u201cOtis,” choreographed by George W. Faison, Gilmore embodied the alternatively loving-fighting suitor with a credibility that made me forget I was watching theater. There is no greater pleasure than seeing a dancer slowly transform from being proficient to being masterful. Gilmore has made the leap in his 13-year tenure with the company. What a lovely gift for the audience.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n