Word: stahlbaum
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...bourgeois German household has been banished in favor of an American apartment decorated in 1960s high tacky. The Stahlbaum children get a giant Barbie doll and a spaceman at their family Christmas Eve party. The guests are dressed in the worst excesses of a quarter-century ago, and before long they are drunk and lubricious. Postmodern choreographer Mark Morris, never at a loss for a flip word or gesture, insists that his take on the Tchaikovsky classic is not a send-up, but that is exactly what it is -- rude, boisterous and more than a little, well, nutty...
Much of his invention is fresh and to the point. As usual with Morris, the production is gender-blind. Mother Stahlbaum is played with zest by a man (Peter Wing Healey), who doubles as a portly Dewdrop in The Waltz of the Flowers. The corps de ballet comprises both males and females, some on pointe, some not. The Snowflake Waltz, without doubt the show's highlight, is performed by this motley assemblage of 22 in an ingenious parody of classical choreography. But instead of the snow drifting down from the rafters, the dancers carry it onstage by the fistful...
...E.T.A. Hoffmann fairy tale, into palatable adult fare. More complex still, a dramatic link must be fabricated to tie together two acts that are little more than kissing cousins. Act I recounts a Christmas episode in which an accident befalling a nutcracker, the favorite present of Clara Stahlbaum, triggers a dream. Toys come to life. A platoon of mice invades her parlor. The nutcracker turns into a prince who leads his young mistress on an imaginary journey to the Kingdom of Sweets. The second act is usually a froth of dazzling leaps, spins and exuberant folk-flavored dances...
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