City Ballet of San Diego "Nutcracker"

Picture-Perfect

Dance Criticism by Janice Steinberg Monday, December 11, 2006

The dancing in City Ballet of San Diego's "Nutcracker" gets better and better, led in this year's opening night cast by Ariana Samuelsson, as a Sugar Plum Fairy who whipped off double fouettés with regal aplomb, and powerful Ivan Bielik as her Cavalier.  City has the prettiest "Nutcracker" in town, too, set in the picture-perfect venue of the ornate, intimate Spreckels Theatre and with charming costumes — both for the Victorian-era Act I and the Kingdom of the Sweets in Act II — designed by David Heuvel of Salt Lake City's Ballet West.

Although it's easy to sneer at "The Nut" as a Christmas bonbon that every ballet company in America has to stage because it's their cash cow, the ballet really is Art, with a gorgeous Tchaikovsky score and serious dancing.  Don't let her frothy name fool you, for instance, the Sugar Plum Fairy has one of the most technically difficult classical roles, and there's plenty of artistry in the divertissements in which dancers representing various national goodies — Spanish chocolate, Arabian coffee — strut their stuff.

All of that fabulous dance, however, is packed into Act II, when the heroine, Clara, enters the magical Kingdom of the Sweets.  Before that, there's a lo-o-o-ong party scene that, in many productions, offers little choreography beyond promenading adults and scampering kids.  It's as if the entire first half of "Wizard of Oz" were Dorothy's black-and-white life on the farm.  But that's, thankfully, not the case with City Ballet's "Nut."

Ivan Bielik as Cavalier and
Ariana Samuelsson as the Sugar Plum Fairy
in "The Nutcracker"

City's inventive choreographer, Elizabeth Rowe Wistrich, even livens up the party scene, giving the adults social-dance variations so intricate that, on Friday, one dancer had to swerve to avoid a collision.  And the mysterious Drosselmeyer led the children in a stunning sequence marked by earthy, second-position squats and flexed feet, as if the "nice" Victorian Christmas party had been invaded by the primal spirit of German Expressionism.  As, of course, it is.  The deepest magic of "The Nutcracker," like that of all true fairy tales, involves its glimpse of the savage forces that lurk in our individual and collective unconscious.

More fine dancing in Act I comes from Wistrich casting a professional as Clara (in many productions, she's played by a young teen).  Janica Smith's Clara was assured and technically brilliant — Smith can do a straight-legged kick behind her that's higher than many front kicks, and what beautiful feet she has.  And her dance with the Nutcracker Prince sizzled, although Gerardo Gil seems too much a mature adult for this role.  And why the occasional shaky lifts from this National Ballet of Mexico veteran who knocked my socks off when he joined the company last season?

The Act II divertissements showed off City's small but uniformly fine company.  Emily Kirn and Daniel Salvador were crisp and saucy in the Spanish dance.  Arabian featured sultry partnering between Mira Cook and Richard Bowman.  (Cook, with a modern dancer's fluidity in her torso, looks made for this role; but, after seeing her in it for three years, I'd like to see her get to try something else.)  Natalie Cook's Chinese did a hopping turn on pointe in the finale.  And Richard Comstock was hilarious as the largest Mother Ginger I've ever seen; also the campest, with red lips that covered half of his face, a la Divine.

Utterly enchanting, Megan Coatney commanded the stage as Rose — as she did playing Carmen in City's production last spring.  Coatney's dancing was fluid and clean, her fouettés precise.  In Heuvel's trim costume (a pink Peter Pan look), she seemed the guiding spirit of this delightful kingdom, her joy shooting over the orchestra pit into the audience.

Sadly, that wasn't the case with Samuelsson's Sugar Plum Fairy. (Wistrich) Samuelsson has returned to her parents' company after two seasons with Chicago's Joffrey Ballet, and that Joffrey training shows in rock-steady balances and elegant port de bras, but where's the animal delight she used to have in dancing?  The hunger to make the audience fall in love with her, so that she seemed to look straight at you even when she must have been blinded by the stage lights?

Still, there was plenty to swoon over in her pas de deux with Bielik, for instance, dramatic lifts where she arched back over his head. Bielik, new to the company this year, did terrific solo work, with big turning jumps and precise landings.

If only City Ballet's "Nutcracker" sounded as good as it looked.  The orchestra problem is a perennial for this high-aiming company that, admirably, insists on live music on a tight budget.  This year, instead of using the uneven Civic Youth Orchestra, City's artistic director Steven Wistrich lined up John Nettles to create the City Ballet Orchestra.  Many of the musicians are nevertheless teens, and there were some rocky, unmagical moments in an otherwise charming production.

City Ballet's
2008 Nutcracker Performance

The Nutcracker with the City Ballet Orchestra conducted by John Nettles
Spreckels Theatre Friday, December 5, 2007 7:30pm Saturday, December 6, 2008 2:00pm and 7:30pm Sunday, December 7, 2008 2:00pm Friday, December 12, 2008 7:30pm Saturday, December 13, 2008 2:00pm and 7:30pm Sunday, December 14, 2008 2:00pm Tickets: $42 - $52 - $62
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