A Nutcracker-themed teashop in Tokyo. Don't ask me why.

When Ivan Nagy took over ENB after Peter Schaufuss went to Berlin, we had another year of Peter’s Nutcracker to contend with until Ben Stevenson’s came in the following year. It was an eccentric production, with interruptions to the score in the first Act where Drosselmeyer suddenly mimes two interpolated piano solos (the real pianist was in the wings), and music for some kind of funeral march of mice on a battlefield. There was all kinds of psychological drama written into the libretto, and loads of names to contend with.

At the beginning of that season, we had a lot of new foreign artists who didn’t speak much English. Given the complexities of the plot, this led to some memorable confusion, such as the time the ballet mistress had to explain ‘this person is your first cousin, but turns out to be someone else in Act II, and that’s Tchaikovsky’s nephew, but he reappears again in a dream sequence as someone else, and that’s Bob, and that’s Aunt Olga who represents Death’  (I’m making this up, because I can’t remember a single aspect of the story, except that it was that complex).

The target of this explanation was three places removed – in other words, she explained this to a Cuban who translated it into Spanish, to a Russian-speaking Pole who spoke enough Spanish to translate it onward into Russian to the visiting artist. Or it might have been the other way around. I don’t think anyone understood their bit of the plot,  and no-one was in a position to know who  had understood what. If you were in the audience and didn’t know what was going on,  you might be relieved to know that half the cast didn’t either.

Ivan sat patiently by watching all this going on, and I think that he probably wished the production would just go away. In another  rehearsal, there was a huge argument about whether the King Rat should do something on the right leg or the left (or something like that).  Not knowing the show, Ivan was powerless in every respect – powerless to offer any expert advice, and powerless to do a different show, and powerless to change the choreography because – unfortunately, you might say – the entire ballet had been meticulously notated in Benesh, and Mark Kay, resident notator, sat in the corner of every rehearsal with his black ringbinder of notation like a traffic warden with a rule book. Being powerless to act, Ivan also remained largely taciturn.

When the King Rat incident had escalated to the point where it had to be resolved before a fight ensued, Ivan turned wearily to the notator for clarification. In an exotic mixture of broad Hungarian accent and comic you-rang-my-lord? intonation, he asked

‘Peter Schaufuss’ secretary?’

Kevin Richmond in Prague, summer 2008

Around the same time as the Gary Harris/Indian River Music story, Kevin Richmond was playing Scrooge in Christopher Hampson’s Christmas Carol. So there we all were, in the National Youth Theatre studios up Holloway Road, doing class (it might even have been the same class).

Scrooge was a speaking part, most suitable for Kev, who had trained as an actor. I think he must have decided to train his voice that day, for instead of doing the allegro, he was sitting out front, warming up for his speaking bit later. Stage Management had brought in an amp and a handheld mike and set it up ready for rehearsals after class.

Typical of Kev, really, to play with anything in sight that could be played with, which in this case was a mic, and amp, and  – what the hell – a box of matches.  So when it came to the medium allegro/batterie enchaînement, I was suddenly aware that it was all a lot easier than usual – for there, in the background, was a sexy, maraca/shaker percussion part providing a whole rhythm section to the rhumba-ish thing I was playing for the exercise. When I looked over, Kev was sitting at the stage manager’s desk, holding a box of matches in front of the handheld mic and shaking it gently in time to the music, providing a lovely amped South American vibe to the piano music.

It’s nice to be able to say about someone that they exemplify a single thing, especially when that thing is rhythm. Kev is famous for his role in Christopher Bruce’s Swansong, in which rhythm plays such a huge part. I also remember Kev going into the pit on tour with ENB and grabbing the cymbals in the percussion section to add extra oomph to the grand allegro bit of class. And my favourite joke is one of Kev’s which depends on rhythm for its effect (though it’s almost impossible to retell on paper) – it goes something like this, but you have to tell it deadpan like Kev does:

“What’s the secret of good comedy?”

“I don’t know, I suppose it depends what you…”

“Timing.”

The more I write these blogs this year, and the more I consider jokes like that one, the more I conclude that great comedy and great art balance on the same knife edge.  That’s the serious bit (or the comic bit). On a pragmatic level, I wish more people would put rhythmic stuff into class like Kev does – it’s so much more fun and effective.

Erina Takahashi backstage at the Coliseum after her Sugar Plum on opening night.

Actions speak louder than words, and this post is about an ‘action’ rather than a one-liner.  It’s topical, since I happened to be swanning around at the opening night of Christopher Hampson’s Nutcracker at the Coliseum last night (thank you to Erina Takahashi for letting me snap her after the show for the blog picture).

After the last suds of G major settled after the pas de deux, I felt the familiar nausea at the thought of the impending ghastly tarantella. Everything about it is horrid, starting with the ugly timbre of the chords on bassoon and cor anglais sounding like ducks in fog,  and the bass pedal (there are only two notes in the bass all the way through – B for about 20 seconds, D for another 20 seconds, and then B again until the end).  It’s usually played too slow, the shifting of the beat onto the anacrusis is clever but pointless, and the inner voices add nothing except rhythmic waffle and harmonic annoyance. It’s the same feeling as I get when I get stuck behind someone trying to turn right at traffic lights.

And then, oh bliss, it never happened, because  as I remembered the minute the orchestra struck up B major instead of minor, Chris had taken the brave decision long ago to ditch it in favour of the male solo from the interpolated Swan Lake pas de deux (aka ‘Tchaikovsky pas de deux’). His reasoning was that if you played the tarantella so that it sounds like a tarantella, it’s too fast for a male virtuoso solo. If you play it at a speed at which you can do steps to it, it’s no longer a tarantella.  I can’t think why more people haven’t done it, it’s crying out to be removed.

At the time, I remember a few critics being sniffy about it, and I overheard someone talk very disapprovingly about the fact that he’d had it transposed into B major.  It’s an odd viewpoint, considering that the tarantella itself was never written as a male solo – it was a national dance ditched from Act I and interpolated into the pas de deux, and – get this – transposed into B minor on Tchaikovsky’s instructions for exactly the same reasons as Chris transposed the other one.  To try and play the ‘authenticity’ card with a ballet, even one by Tchaikovsky, is an odd game indeed in the 21st century.

It’s a small thing which shouldn’t have caused anyone to raise an eyebrow, but this is the ballet world and its prize poodle, the Nutcracker, so it took courage and artistic conviction to do it. Maybe the dance critics should award a prize for Best Cut in an Overworked Classic.