Crackin' Those Nuts

So, how are the holidays progressing for you? My family gave me several ballerina-related gifts and we all got together in the bay area to visit my sister and her children. On Christmas eve we all piled on the couch and attempted to make an eight year old girl and a six year old boy sit still long enough to watch the Maurice Sendak version of the Nutcracker (it's on Netflix, FYI) which I hadn't seen since I was a little girl. At one point I picked up my nephew and rolled him bodily on to my lap and tried to pin him to my chest so I could watch the TV rather than him. This worked for about five minutes. You do what you can.
When the first "doll" hops onto pointe my niece said "wo, how did that happen?" and I said "magic". My mother offered "practice" but I insisted. No. It's magic.
I remember watching this version of the Nutcracker on TV with my mother and being kind of confused because the story is so different from the usual Nutcrackers. Clara morphs in to a grown-up and then lots of weird things happen with Drosslemeyer wearing a series of great big hats. But, you miss out on the best stuff, like the candy canes, Mother Ginger, and the Arabian dance. And, in my opinion, the Sugarplum Fairy is not a suggestion, it's a requirement.
Clara's tutu seems so strange to me. Unreal. It looks like it's injection molded. Totally unmoving. I am sure it's just a condition of the plate/overskirt being so wavy (like a cartoon tutu) and the whole thing being tacked very firmly together. But still, weird.
Also, I'd forgotten that the mouse king in this one has a varying quantity of heads, a nod to the original. I am pretty sure that this company is still doing a variation of this production.

Next year we're hoping to get all the girls in the family together for a trip to San Francisco's production. They aren't shy about declaring themselves the best in the country, and you have to admit: it is certainly shiny!

Looking For Ballerinas in All The Wrong Places

Well, I've done it. I've finished off Nutcracker and Mouseking, the story that the Nutcracker was based on. It was interesting in a few ways. For one, the mouse king was this terrifying 7-headed rodent creature that was obviously inspired by the German folk legend of the rat king. If you've never heard of it before I am terribly sorry to introduce it to you, but it gives you a certain understanding of the story we are working with, here. The little girl (named Marie, not Clara) sort of vaguely helps the nutcracker (Drosselmeyer's bewitched nephew) defeat the mouse king (VERY vaguely) and then she marries him, despite the fact that she is 8 years old. There you go. There is a brief trip through the land of sweets, but they don't stop to talk to anyone on account of the residents all being terribly grumpy (because they all have sore teeth, naturally). Why did we make this story in to a beloved ballet classic, again?

Random write-up in mental_floss magazine this month:

not particularly informative or anything, it just caught my eye.

A Brief Briefing

Well, I had my second acupuncture appointment at the beginning of the week. It was dreadful and they crammed needles in my ears and in between my toes and other awful things. It hurt and I bled and I was terribly happy to go home afterward. My knees hurt like the end times for the rest of the day and I spent most of the afternoon lying on the couch watching anime and feeling sorry for myself. The next day, though, class was not nearly as painful as I had feared. Perhaps it just takes a while to have a positive effect? Or is it just that I felt so dreadful the day before that a change back to the status quo seemed like a blessing? I suppose we shall see in time.
In more interesting news I recently downloaded a copy of the original story the Nutcracker was based on, and so far it is a total hallucinatory crazy-fest. I will report back after I've polished it off.

Anyway, in case I don't hit the blog again until next week:

Look Me In The Eye When You Say That

Tis the season for everyone on Facebook to post youtube videos of Nutcracker! I know I have said it before, but I just HATE it when the camera zooms in on the dancer's faces. AUGH! Dancers do not intensively study facial expressions for twenty years! Show us the whole picture! Arms, legs, even fingertips are probably doing something more interesting than their faces.
A few weeks ago in class my teacher said something about "you know how when you watch a ballet you see the dancers do [whatever it was]. Oh, well you probably don't because you are watching their faces."
What? Who goes to a ballet and focuses on facial expressions? I understand the need to look toward the audience so that they will continue watching you, but... what. Of course, I am nearsighted and have been known to forget to bring my glasses while attending a ballet and sitting on the grand balcony. So... bigger is better for me! I have also attended ballets while sitting in the orchestra pit, and honestly I still wasn't looking that hard at faces. *shrug*

Probably because I was looking at pretty shoes and pretty costumes. Speaking of which...

In the spirit of the season (or something) I went through a bunch of old folders and notebooks from college and dug out some ballet costumes I drew when I was about 18. I have quite a few! These were paper doll clothes, obviously, so they aren't as detailed as they might have been, and after all these years I can find lots of things to nit pick about, but they are still kind of fun. Here we see that I was still groovin' on the candy cane design I came up with at age 11ish. I am going to account for the lack of seams by saying it's super stretchy.

Should I nit pick? Should I? It's my natural state of being to nit pick at clothing designs until I turn blue. If I was doing this today I would make the candy cane stripey things at the hip fuller so that it covers your ... area. If you catch my meaning.

Crackin' Those Nuts

Tis the season! I was inspired to dig these up when I was over at my mom's house last weekend. These were supposed to be for the Nutcracker, which I had just seen performed live for the second time. I was maybe eleven. JUST eleven. I don't remember exactly but I do remember that this was the year I saw Nina Baratova dance as the Sugar Plum Fairy and I had a huge girl crush on her at the time so that was pretty awesome.
I was at an in-between phase where I had decided that no, actually I did not want to be a lawyer when I grew up, but didn't know what to fill in the blank with. I had always spent my free time designing clothes, but this was right around the age when I decided that it was a viable career option. I hadn't learned much about sewing and clothing construction yet, so you have to give me a break. Also, I don't have any idea who most of these were supposed to be for.

This was for the candy canes, though. The ones who dance with a hoop. I remember this one very distinctly, it was supposed to be white and the stripey bits were, of course, white and red. I dig that it's so unconventional.

I have no idea what this one is for, though. All I know is that my note on it says that it should have white bishop sleeves (I didn't know they were called bishop sleeves then, so it says "big poofy sleeves"), a green bodice, and a darker overskirt thingy. I honestly don't know what shape the skirt was supposed to be. Bell-type tutu?

 No clue on the wearer of this, either. But, the note says it's probably pink floaty chiffon, with rhinestones where all the dots are.

Another for who-knows-who. BUT I had to include this one because I thought it should be made from a fabric that my mom had a skirt made from. I am all about reduce-reuse-recycle, and I STILL HAVE some of this fabric. 

See! There it is!--------------------------------->

This one is obviously the snowflakes, which were always my favorite part when I was a kid (excepting Mother Ginger, my other favorite part). I am still not entirely sure why snowflakes traditionally wear long floaty romantic tutus rather than classical tutus, which are, you know, snowflake shaped. Anyway, I guess 11 year old me was a rebel. I still think this is a cute idea, if poorly drawn. It would take unconventional materials, but that is the rage these days anyway. 

Also, it totally reminds me of that scene from Fantasia! You had better believe I was influenced by that, too. -------------------------------->