Washington Post: Opinion: Innovation made ‘The Nutcracker’ a Christmas classic. A pandemic won’t stop it

By Melissa R. Klapper

21 December 2020

Melissa R. Klapper is a professor at Rowan University and author of “Ballet Class: An American History.”

Covid-19 has cost us cherished holiday traditions. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warns against traveling for family visits, Santas and menorahs sit behind plastic partitions, religious services have moved outside, and the National Christmas Tree Lighting went online. And for many Americans, particularly painful is the absence of live performances of “The Nutcracker.”

But the story of “The Nutcracker” in America is a story of innovation. And the same creative spirit that will help Americans re-create at least a little of this treasured ritual can help revitalize the ballet for generations to come. “The Nutcracker” was not always beloved, nor was it always associated with the holiday season. When it premiered in Russia in 1892, hopes were high for a ballet created by the same team — composer Peter Tchaikovsky and choreographer Marius Petipa, this time with the aid of his assistant Lev Ivanov — that had so successfully ushered “Sleeping Beauty” to the stage two years earlier. But Tchaikovsky himself thought the new ballet was “infinitely worse” than “Sleeping Beauty,” and the critical and audience reception was lukewarm. “The Nutcracker” was only sporadically revived over the next few decades. Some Americans had a chance to see a condensed version staged by the Ballet Russe de Monte Carlo in the 1940s on the company’s many cross-country tours, and Disney’s “Fantasia” helped popularize the music. But it wasn’t until 1944 that the San Francisco Ballet performed the first full-length “Nutcracker” in the United States.

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