Lavish new Nutcracker re-creates the Nashville of a bygone century
by Martin Brady
After nearly 20 years of holiday performances of the Nutcracker, the Nashville Ballet is shaking up its conceptual approach to Tchaikovsky's treasured 1892 fantasy tale. The new mounting, under the direction of artistic director Paul Vasterling, is receiving serious fanfare in the form of a gala opening night, with a dinner at the Hermitage Hotel (Mayor Dean in attendance) plus a stroll around the cordoned-off streets surrounding TPAC. A large tent beckons theatergoers into a bygone Nashville streetscape, replete with falling snow, stylized mercantile storefronts and the aroma of roasting chestnuts.
But that's just the window dressing for a main event that's been in the planning stages for nearly four years.
"We went studying," says Vasterling, speaking of himself, set designer Shigeru Yaji and costume designer Campbell Baird. Their efforts have yielded a Nutcracker set during the time of the 1897 Tennessee Centennial Exposition, which celebrated Tennessee's 100th anniversary of statehood and featured exhibitions on industry, agriculture, commerce, transportation, education and cultural achievements. (Among other things, the exposition gave Nashville the Parthenon in Centennial Park and codified the city's designation as the "Athens of the South.")
"The basic idea is part of a national trend of setting the ballet in the city in which it is being performed," Vasterling says. "Our research originated in the Nashville Room of the public library. We steeped ourselves in the Nashville of the Victorian era and studied old photos from the Centennial Exposition, which was a defining moment in Nashville history, when 1.5 million visitors arrived from all over the South."
In Vasterling's reimagining, the ballet's young heroine, Clara, lives in a home whose interior is based on that of Belle Meade Mansion. Meanwhile, the exposition serves as inspiration for the little girl's magic dreamland. Various local historical figures appear in the tableaux, among them stage and screen actress Lucille La Verne (1872-1945) and former Vanderbilt chancellor James H. Kirkland (1859-1939).
"Think about a midway with exhibits from all over the world," says Vasterling. "There's a Spanish lady, a Russian dollmaker, a French candymaker and others. These characters connect Acts 1 and 2, as the little girl's subconscious plays out its fantasy scenario."
With Paul Gambill leading the Nashville Symphony through the familiar but lushly enchanting score, some 160 performers—including the ballet company, local youngsters and other extras—will enact the spectacle.
The plum role of the Sugar Plum Fairy will be danced at alternating performances by ballet veterans Sadie Harris, Christine Rennie and Kimberly Ratcliffe, each of whom has danced the role previously in her career.
For those who had grown used to seeing Tennessee Titans football players in the role of Mother Ginger, that character's been replaced by one Madame Bonbonnierre, a colorful cross between Marie Antoinette and Dolly Parton.
"Maybe someday we can get Dolly herself to play the role," Vasterling muses.
This will be designer Baird's 13th Nutcracker; it's only Shigeru's second, though the Oregon-based designer has worked previously with Vasterling on 2006's Velveteen Rabbit. Baird's 180 costumes were built in Atlanta, New York and Nashville.
"The scenery and costumes are brand new, as is some of the choreography," Vasterling continues. "The visual progression in the ballet moves from sepia-toned to more colorful as the scenes advance, not unlike The Wizard of Oz. Our treatment also includes an ice-skating scene at Shelby Bottoms Pond that offers a re-creation of a Currier & Ives print."
Some things about the Nutcracker are immutable; for example, Lev Ivanovich Ivanov's original Act 2 pas de deux. "You don't want to mess with that," says Vasterling. "It's classic. But about 80 percent of the choreography is different, and partly that's because we're telling a slightly different story.
"Needless to say," he concludes, "it's the biggest-scale production Nashville Ballet has ever mounted, and we're aiming to establish it as a Nashville tradition for a long time to come."
The right Stuff
Jim Reyland's restaging of his 1999 play Stuff features two of Nashville's most important actors of the recent era, Barry Scott and Matthew Carlton. But the taut, two-handed character study is almost overshadowed by the new digs housing Reyland's Writer's Stage production company.
An abandoned accounting office next to a car dealership at the corner of 10th and Charlotte will be Reyland's—to do with what he will—for approximately 18 months. A temporary gift from Gulch-savvy developers Steve Armistead and Bill Barkley, the facility required plenty of grunt work to become theater-ready. But Reyland and friends successfully gutted and cleaned the dusty joint, installed lighting and sound equipment and decorated enough of the place to add an artsy ambience, with a main foyer and hallways that will display paintings by local artists. Reyland plans to stage more of his own original works here, but theater companies looking for a performance venue might also want to check into its availability. (There's ample free parking too.)
Meanwhile, the cluttered stage that is the setting for Stuff is all too appropriate for Reyland's tale of two disconnected ex-GIs, who set about to clean up an old warehouse but end up revealing a great deal about themselves. Milton and Bobby cover the mundane (SEC football) as well as the meaty (sexual issues, discrimination) in their joshing Southern style; then things take an intense turn when the two start to recall their days in the Army.
Reyland's updates to the script include moments when his characters break the fourth wall with brief asides to the audience. The essential tale is intact, however, with only the references to Ed Asner and Carol Channing sounding a little more dated than they might have a decade ago when the piece first debuted at The Belcourt.
As for Scott and Carlton, they're in fine form, creating full-bodied portrayals of rather lost but certainly not hopeless figures. Reyland grants his characters crackling, natural dialogue, and the two actors up the stakes with alternating power and poignance. Stuff runs through Dec. 20 at the venue at 1008 Charlotte Ave.
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