Royal Winnipeg Ballet’s Nutcracker continues to delight
There’s no better way to embrace the holiday spirit than taking a seat for a performance of The Royal Winnipeg Ballet’s perennial favourite, The Nutcracker.
Photo by Rejean Brandt
Originally performed in 1892 in Russia, the ballet has enjoyed enormous success, in part to the memorable score by Pyotr IlyichTchaikovsky. If you wait just a moment, the strains will start dancing through your head. This year’s production is set in 1913 in Winnipeg (presumably) and includes a few distinctly Canadian touches. The ballet opens with a friendly game of hockey sticks, includes appearances by riders inspired by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and strikes a high note with a rousing rendition of the high-flying Hopak by Winnipeg’s own Rusulka Ukrainian dance troupe.
Audiences are delighted by the appearance of so many tiny dancers on the stage, some dressed as bouncing angels in taffeta gowns and others in fluffy mini polar bear outfits.
Photo by Samanta Katz 
Photo from RWB Archives 
Photo by Rejean Brandt 
Photo by Rejean Brandt 
Photo by Rejean Brandt 
Photo by Rejean Brandt 
Photo by Vince Pahkala 
Photo by Samanta Katz 
Photo courtesy of RWB 
Photo by Keith Levit 
Photo by Rejean Brandt
The story follows the musings of 12 year-old Clara who receives a hand-crafted nutcracker at a Christmas Eve party. The ballet enters a dreamland inhabited by the terrifying Mouse King, much less terrifying reindeer and mice as well as dancers inspired by ancient Arabia, Spain and China. And of course there are the sugar plum fairies, no less than 14 of them, performing their signature dance while snow settles on the background spruces and flakes fall gently from the sky.
The Nutcracker runs until December 29 at the Centennial Concert Hall.
