Healthy Famz Healthy Family News essential tips for a healthy family. Explore practical advice to keep your family happy and healthy.
Related Articles
De Harde Noot is back at BAM for the holidays
The Difficult Nut comes home to BAM for the holidays! This rollicking reinterpretation of Tchaikovsky's beloved music was created in 1991 by the Mark Morris Dance Group. The Nutcracker first appeared on BAM during the Christmas season in 1992. Beloved by audiences of all ages, the show has become a holiday classic in its own right and returns to the BAM stage for six encores, including the latest, from December 12 to 22.
Of course, if you want to create a new classic, it doesn't hurt to start with one of the most beloved ballets of all time. The Nutcrackercreated by Russian composer Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky and choreographer Marius Petipa as a classical ballet in two acts in 1892, it is one of the most recognizable works in the repertoire.
What's more, The Nutcracker is a ballet especially loved by children for its imaginative cast of characters, including the heroic Nutcracker Prince, the sinister Mouse King, the Sugar Fairy, sparkling snowflakes, spinning angels, leaping folkloric dancers and more. Generations of young New Yorkers were introduced to the winter wonders of The Nutcracker through fairytale stagings by iconic choreographers such as George Balanchine and Mikhail Baryshnikov.
Mark Morris set out to create his own unique version of this eternal winter wonder while serving as Dance Director at Belgium's prestigious National Opera House. He imagined a Nutcracker both familiar and new and restored passages from ETA Hoffmann's children's novella, 'The Nutcracker and the Mouse King', which Petipa and Tchaikovsky had left out of their ballet.
Morris based his playfully witty retro-modern visual approach on the comic art of Charles Burns, whose brightly drawn work evokes monsters and gangsters to tell complex contemporary stories about growing up. Starting with sketches by Burns, Morris conceived a dance that would combine sweetly nostalgic and boisterously optimistic images of American family life with playful allusions to the sometimes terrifying challenges of childhood, adolescence and romance.
Adrianne Lobel's sets have been transplanted The Nutcracker from its romantic German origins to a swinging modern household illuminated by a console TV. Costume designer Martin Pakledinaz created flamboyant retro-chic outfits that brought this cartoonish yet recognizable world vividly to life on stage. Raucous parties, dancing GI Joes, whimsical costumes and a 'Waltz of the Snowflakes' like no other The Difficult Nut a beautiful, whimsical theatrical adventure.
And yet, at its core, this dazzling invention remains a family-friendly tribute to a beloved classic work. Despite a radically different vision and tone on stage, it is still Tchaikovsky's lush score – performed live by the MMDG Music Ensemble – that drives this colorful retelling, with Morris' lyrical, immediately appealing choreography capturing the warm spirit of an essential tradition of family vacations.
Psst….Check out the best holiday markets in NY
New York Family
