What else does one do with a little extra time on his hands at the end of the year but see more Nutcrackers? It’s the natural choice every year, it seems.
Haglund caught NYCB’s performance on Saturday afternoon that featured Ashley Laracey and Russell Janzen as Sugarplum Fairy and Her Cavalier, and yesterday’s early matinee with Lauren King and Robert Fairchild in those roles.
The two Sugarplum Fairies have in common a long developmental path to the soloist level: Ashley’s was ten years in the making while Lauren’s was nine. At the time of their promotions last February, they each already possessed a mature stage presence and, as Haglund pointed out in an early post last January, they offer two of the most elegant profiles in the company: long necks with beautifully defined jawlines that often compliment or extend the lines of the arms and legs and enhance the harmony of the visual image.
On Saturday, in only her second performance of the Sugarplum Fairy, Ashley already had found her own voice among a crop of individualistic Sugarplum Fairies whose tunes ranged comparatively from elementary Chop Sticks to symphonic to heavy metal. Although at times she seemed to echo Janie Taylor's expansiveness, what differentiated Ashley’s interpretation from everyone else’s was her full-bodied musicality. As is her beautiful tendency, she followed the ends of musical phrases with her head as though chasing after a whiff of perfume.
Her Cavalier, Russell Janzen, demonstrated accomplished partnering skills including the accurate catch of the ballerina’s arms during the tricky step-over pique pirouette that ends in a penche arabesque. By the way, most of NYCB’s experienced Nutcracker couples need reminding that a large part of the audience knows that Maria Tallchief and Andre Eglevsky and others who followed made that a true double step-over turn with the partner catching the backs of the ballerina’s wrists as she dove into the penche – not a 1-1/8 step-over turn where the partner catches the fronts of the wrists and awkwardly wrangles the ballerina down into the penche. (Newbies are excepted from this criticism.) But back to Russell Janzen who is quite the handsome cavalier with good lines and articulate feet. But it was apparent that he, like so many of NYCB’s cavaliers including Robert Fairchild, neither practice turns en a la seconde nor coupe jeté manège every week, let alone every day. All the cavaliers that Haglund saw this year were mushy and un-brilliant in those two moves.
Fairchild’s technical efforts were not helped at all by the lethargic conducting of guest conductor Raphael Jimenez who made a bit of a mess of certain sections of the score yesterday. Fairchild's partnering of Lauren King was much better than the first year in which they performed together in Nutcracker but he still doesn’t give her all the security that she needs at this point. She’s not Tiler Peck for whom a partner is purely optional no matter what the trick. That said, he did manage to make the final promenade in which he continually switched grips with the Sugarplum Fairy as grand and climactic as ever seen with the final swooney layover to the side beautifully dramatic.
Lauren’s Sugarplum Fairy has grown immensely in confidence and style since her debut last year. Yesterday she demonstrated such lovely and speedy chaine turns and pirouettes so vertically balanced that you could almost see the plumb line down the front of her bodice. Like Ashley, her musicality generously flowed through her upper body. Haglund noticed a new sense of refinement in Lauren’s arms which are beautifully sculpted from the shoulders. Also, the articulation and definition in the feet were much improved.
The other principals and soloists during these two Nutcrackers turned out admirable performances. Rebecca Krohn and Meagan Mann were seductive, smooth and silky Coffees. Teresa Reichlen and Mary Elizabeth Sell were spirited Dew Drops. Alina Dronova was radiant in Marzipan but Indiana Woodward was a little like a bull in a china closet in the same role – though not without charm. Sean Suozzi and Giovanni Villalobos scored 10s with their Candy Cane hoops and Sean articulated some interesting delayed musical phrasing in places.
Haglund hates to end the year on a complaint, but really – honestly – good heavens to Betsy and Murgatroyd – isn't the pre-curtain admonition recording volume turned up way too high? The ear piercing level of the preemptive scolding about cell phones and photography was first noticed in the fall, but has finally risen to the point where it’s noise pollution at a harmful level, especially in the 4th Ring.
Let’s wind this up with a final Pump Bump Award – a crystal laden platform pump that comes with its own set of crutches – for Ashley Laracey and Lauren King, two of Haglund’s favorite ballerinas, who he hopes to see plenty of in the Winter and Spring Seasons.