Nutcracker!
Little E's school got to see the Washington Ballet's Nutcracker today and it was the best damn Nutcracker I've ever seen. It was lush with color, full of energy and relevance, chock-a-block with powerful male dancers, and it had the most striking corps of fluttering snowflakes I've ever seen. On the way there I was silently composing an apology to the students -- in the old fashioned sense of the word as well as the regular one -- because ballet can seem infinitely silly, especially, I imagine, to ten year-old boys.
But no apology was needed.
There were very few men-in-tights moments and instead we were treated to the most lavish, delicious, richly textured rendition I've ever seen. And maybe they've done this before, but someone had the brilliant idea to place the story in Washington and adapt all the parts to DC- or American Revolution references. So the wind-up dolls that are usually kind of queer harlequins or dancers with pigtails and creepily rouged cheeks were in Dolly Madison and John Paul Jones -- Jones wore a deep blue jacket and wig like George Washington's -- it was fabulous. And the children at the party all got Native American headdresses and bows and arrows from Drosselmeyer. And of course the battle between the Rat King and the mice became King George, of course, with his men in red coats fighting the pilgrims -- er, mice.
O, it was fab! Absolutely fab! And they gave the second-act soloists a total makeover, with Davy Crockett dancing with Anacostia squaws (or something; I don't think I have that quite right) and the Waltz of the Flowers now a tribute to the cherry blossoms, and the Spanish solo taken over by a squad of men kicking the shit out of the sky.
The Rat King was a hit, as always, curling up and dying in high campy fashion.
The little clowns came streaming out of a merry go round instead of a big poofy dress and they were, for the first time ever, possibly the best act of the show.
All the way back down Constitution Avenue I dreamed up a lesson you could do to get the kids to look out the window. Assign each kid a building in DC and have them call out two facts when you pass their building. Give them a map and have them memorize the order of the buildings. Include roads and rivers and monuments in the list. Give someone the National Cathedral.
To prep the kids for ballet you'd have them measure how high they could jump, try to lift their feet over their shoulders, partner them up and have them try spinning each other, and let them judge each other performing a stage cross. I'm pretty sure Eli's teacher thinks I have the potential to be a pain in the ass but I hope she calls me next year.
But no apology was needed.
There were very few men-in-tights moments and instead we were treated to the most lavish, delicious, richly textured rendition I've ever seen. And maybe they've done this before, but someone had the brilliant idea to place the story in Washington and adapt all the parts to DC- or American Revolution references. So the wind-up dolls that are usually kind of queer harlequins or dancers with pigtails and creepily rouged cheeks were in Dolly Madison and John Paul Jones -- Jones wore a deep blue jacket and wig like George Washington's -- it was fabulous. And the children at the party all got Native American headdresses and bows and arrows from Drosselmeyer. And of course the battle between the Rat King and the mice became King George, of course, with his men in red coats fighting the pilgrims -- er, mice.
O, it was fab! Absolutely fab! And they gave the second-act soloists a total makeover, with Davy Crockett dancing with Anacostia squaws (or something; I don't think I have that quite right) and the Waltz of the Flowers now a tribute to the cherry blossoms, and the Spanish solo taken over by a squad of men kicking the shit out of the sky.
The Rat King was a hit, as always, curling up and dying in high campy fashion.
The little clowns came streaming out of a merry go round instead of a big poofy dress and they were, for the first time ever, possibly the best act of the show.
All the way back down Constitution Avenue I dreamed up a lesson you could do to get the kids to look out the window. Assign each kid a building in DC and have them call out two facts when you pass their building. Give them a map and have them memorize the order of the buildings. Include roads and rivers and monuments in the list. Give someone the National Cathedral.
To prep the kids for ballet you'd have them measure how high they could jump, try to lift their feet over their shoulders, partner them up and have them try spinning each other, and let them judge each other performing a stage cross. I'm pretty sure Eli's teacher thinks I have the potential to be a pain in the ass but I hope she calls me next year.