San Francisco Ballet in Helgi Tomasson's Nutcracker. Photo by Erik Tomasson.
When you consider how little concert dance makes it to PBS these days (the situation on cable isn’t much better) and when you consider how little of what makes it to the tube is produced in this country (rather than bought or leased from abroad), the arrival of the San Francisco Ballet’s Nutcracker on the small screen this week in the Great Performances series is a real boost to the company’s prestige. If I am not mistaken, SFB has been missing from the tube since the taping of Lar Lubovitch’s Othello six years ago and the bets are on that Helgi Tomasson’s staging of the holiday classic will be around for much longer. I can’t say yet if the production will endure on TV as long as Mikhail Baryshnikov’s version which hung around until long after Baryshnikov and Gelsey Kirkland had retired, but who knows?
SFB’s production, helmed by Judy Flannery from the local PBS outlet, KQED, is as alluring as they come, thanks to Michael Yeargan’s visual recreation of the city in 1915, abetted by Martin Pakledinaz’s Edwardian costumes, James F. Ingalls’ lighting and Wendall K. Harrington’s Projection design, most of it retained for this project. It was all recorded in the course of two performances last December at the War Memorial Opera House, directed by the TV veteran, Matthew Diamond.
San Francisco Ballet in Helgi Tomasson's Nutcracker. Photo by Erik Tomasson.
The TV production arrives packaged with an introduction by the Olympics champion skater, Kristy Yamaguchi, who, in this context, inadvertently, comes off as a cheery, condescending bore. At least, during her two mercifully brief appearances, we get a closer glimpse of Pakledinaz’s fabulous costumes. I wonder if these intros by celebrities make pieces of such universal appeal as Nutcracker more palatable to Joe Six-Pack and his ballet school tots, but it’s not enough to keep me up nights. The fast crawl at the end of the telecast omits giving specific credit to many members of the cast, and I couldn’t help wishing that they deserved a mention more than a second helping of Yamaguchi’s blather. This entertainment is all about them, not her.
The dancing is what concerns us, and the TV Nutcracker is not an alternative, but a parallel experience to seeing the production live. Diamond’s cameras don’t seem to miss much of the action, and on the tube, you can catch some of the character reactions in the Stahlbaum household that will elude you at the War Memorial. Diamond also brings a lovely intimacy to the Act 2 dances, which, in person, can seem slightly dwarfed on the Opera House stage, and the director is expert at juxtaposing close-ups and long shots, so you don’t seem to miss much of anything important. And where else will you see snowflakes hanging off the dancers’ eyebrows at the end of Act I?
Tomasson cannily cast this performance with a mixture of SFB veterans and newcomers. Yuan Yuan Tan and Pierre-François Vilanoba are all authority and dazzle in the snow pas de deux. Vanessa Zahorian brings graciousness to the Sugar Plum Fairy, while Maria Kochetkova and Davit Karapetyan sustain the classical ideals in the grand pas de deux. If Kochetkova seems to flirt with the camera, it’s almost impossible for the viewer not to flirt back.
Vanessa Zahorian in Helgi Tomasson's Nutcracker. Photo by Erik Tomasson.
Damian Smith was deputized as Uncle Drosselmeyer after Ashley Wheater injured himself last year and one feels that Smith’s interpretation had not completely ripened by the time of the recording, but, in all other respects, this is pretty much a superb portrait of SFB’s strengths at this period in its 75-year history. I am probably not alone in wishing that PBS had, instead, recorded the best of last season’s New Works Festival for the world to see, but, let’s face it, even in the not-for-profit world, sugar plums sell.
Tomasson’s production, which owes a good deal to the Lev Ivanov original, hews scrupulously to the Tchaikovsky score, conducted with flair by Martin West. This staging, however, doesn’t aim for much psychological depth. Clara, despite physical signs of burgeoning femininity in Elizabeth Powell’s lovely portrayal, remains a pre-teen, rather than an adolescent in the throes of her first infatuation. Still, the previous two company Nutcracker productions by the Christensen Brothers also kept away from suggesting the phenomenon of teen-age sexuality, so you might consider a chaste SFB Nutcracker part of the city’s tradition and enjoy this company’s 75th anniversary treat for what’s there, rather than lamenting what’s not.
KQED-TV(Ch. 9) will air this two-hour Great Performances: Dance in America production Wednesday, Dec. 17, at 8 p.m., and it will be repeated several times on the station’s digital channels. For the schedule in other communities, check local listings. This Nutcracker is also available on DVD from Opus Arte/Naxos ($29.95, much cheaper from Amazon). It includes a mini-documentary on that unique phenomenon in San Francisco history, the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition, the inspiration for Tomasson’s visual design; and although it does not contain the introduction by Kristy Yamaguchi, it includes much rare and fascinating footage.
The San Francisco Ballet performs Nutcracker at the War Memorial Opera House through Dec. 28 at 7 p.m. (No performances Christmas day). Call 415.865.2000 or visit www.sfballet.org
