This production of The Nutcracker draws (some) inspiration from the original text of The Nutcracker and the Mouse King by Prussian author E. T. A. Hoffmann. Written in the Romantic/Gothic fantasy style, it is somewhat closer to a modern sensibility than the saccharine, culturally questionable French adaptation by Alexander Dumas many years later. This version seeks to combine the charm of the second, with a glimpse also into the disciplined, rather rigid life of Marie’s bourgeois family and the surreal world inhabited by her exceedingly odd godmother, Drosselmeier.

As the story unfolds, Drosselmeier becomes the conduit through which Marie is awakened into the fantastical landscapes of her own imagination; realms populated by familiar, yet strangely transformed characters. She and the Nutcracker then become an integral component of the action rather than mere observers. This allows for the second act to occur as a manifestation of Marie’s vivid imagination.

As quoted by Jack Zipes in the introduction to Hoffmann’s book, I use the following text as a jumping-off point for this reimagined version of The Nutcracker:

“The question that Hoffmann asks in this tale is how to infiltrate a good and proper bourgeois home to free children’s imaginations so that they can recognize and fulfill their desires. In this regard, the title of Hoffmann’s fairy tale is misleading. The story is not about the nutcracker and the mouse king; rather, it is about the curious child Marie and the ambivalent, somewhat threatening figure of Drosselmeier, the mysterious artist and teacher.”

The ballet takes place on Christmas eve in the Austrian Embassy, residence of the Austrian ambassador, Herr Stauhlbaum, and his family. Marie, the protagonist of our story, is filled with glee as she anticipates what is likely to be a magical evening of celebration. Not even the antics of her mischievous brother, Fritz, nor the looming presence of the intimidating butler, can diminish her joy. Louise, the eldest daughter, arrives home from her Parisian boarding school and is also thrilled by the excitement of the evening to come.

Dignitaries and emissaries invited from around the world all arrive to celebrate the holiday, bringing gifts to share that fascinate Marie. Christmas gifts are given to the children in attendance. Even Mother Ginger, the matron of the local orphanage, is invited to share in the festivities.

The final guest to arrive is Drosselmeier, the sister of Frau Stauhlbaum. She is a strange character who has been known to embarrass the Stauhlbaums with her impromptu displays of magical skill. Drosselmeier is a magician, in every sense of the word, and takes great joy in opening the minds of the children in attendance to all that is possible in the world of imagination. She takes great care of and interest in Marie, one who shares her love of imaginary play. She bestows a seemingly final gift to Marie in the form of a Nutcracker. In this gift, Marie sees a world of possibility. He is a character with whom she could experience a whole new realm of stories.

Little does she know that later that evening, Drosselmeier will make every imagined dream connected with this new toy come to life. A journey unfolds to a world of life-sized toys and soldiers. Her family butler, always a menacing presence, shows his true nature as the Mouse King, out to destroy her fantasy with his army of mice. There is a tremendous battle and the winners of the day, Marie and her Nutcracker, journey through the Pine Forest to a land where familiar faces and memories from the party engage and entertain them in a world seemingly controlled by Drosselmeier and her magic.

As the story ends, Marie, still enchanted by her new toy, is left wondering where reality stopped, and imagination began.

Sasha Janes is professor of ballet at the IU Jacobs School of Music. He was born in Perth, Australia, and received his formal dance training from the Australian Ballet School. He has danced professionally with West Australian Ballet, Australian Ballet, Hong Kong Ballet, and Dayton Ballet, performing principal roles in works by Jiří Kylián, George Balanchine, Nacho Duato, Jean-Pierre Bonnefoux, Marius Petipa, Septime Webre, Anthony Tudor, Dwight Rhoden, Alonzo King, Twyla Tharp, Alvin Ailey, and many others. At the invitation of Jean-Pierre Bonnefoux and associate artistic director Patricia McBride, Janes joined Charlotte Ballet in 2003. In 2006, he was commissioned to choreograph his first ballet, Lascia la Spina, Cogli la Rosa, and has since choreographed several ballets for Charlotte Ballet, including Carmen, Dangerous Liaisons, We Danced Through Life, Last Lost Chance, Shelter, At First Sight, Loss, The Four Seasons, The Red Dress, Utopia, Playground Teasers, The Seed and the Soil, Chaconne, Queen, Sketches from Grace, and Rhapsodic Dances, which was performed as part of the Kennedy Center’s Ballet Across America series in June 2013. The Washington Post called Janes “a choreographer to watch.” He was a participant in New York City Ballet’s Choreographic Institute and has been a guest choreographer for Richmond Ballet’s New Works Festival. He was a principal dancer with Charlotte Ballet for eight seasons before being named rehearsal director in 2007 then associate artistic director in 2012 and adding the title resident choreographer in 2013. In fall 2016, Janes premiered his ballet Saudade for the Jacobs School of Music, where he served as guest faculty. In spring 2017, he premiered his Wuthering Heights for Charlotte Ballet, inspired by Emily Bronte’s classic novel. In 2023, he was appointed artistic director of the Chautauqua Institution’s School of Dance.

Equally adept at conducting symphony, opera, and ballet, Judith Yan has held staff conductor positions at San Francisco Opera, Canadian Opera Company, and National Ballet of Canada. A strong supporter of new works, she has conducted numerous world premieres, including An American Dream (Perla/Murphy) for Seattle Opera, Dracula (Pastor/Kilar) for West Australian Ballet, February (Kaminsky/Moore), and Ours (Estacio) for Opera on the Avalon, where she is music director and principal conductor. Comments from recent critics include “The superb conducting of Judith Yan was finely balanced—sensitively accompanying the vocalists, and at the same time, allowing the orchestra to soar when called for by the music,” George Dansker/Opera News (New Orleans Opera, Madama Butterfly). Reviews also include “Judith Yan, in her Opera Omaha debut, conducted masterfully. The orchestra maintained tonal integrity even when playing delicately and softly, providing a secure foundation of support for the singers. Yan knew exactly when to pull the orchestra back and when to let it loose,” Kevin Hanrahan/Opera News (Opera Omaha, Suor Angelica). Recent performances include Don Giovanni and Suor Angelica with Opera Omaha, Madama Butterfly with New Orleans Opera, An American Dream with the Jacobs School of Music, The Rape of Lucretia with San Francisco Opera (Merola), La Boheme with Vancouver Opera, Orfeo with Kentucky Opera, Grigorovich’s La Bayadère and Swan Lake with Korean National Ballet, Don Quixote with West Australian Ballet, and six symphonic programs for Saskatoon Symphony, with repertoire ranging from Tchaikovsky, Beethoven, and Dvorak to Gipps, Richter, and Copland.

Thaddeus Strassberger, born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, is a citizen of the U.S., Italy, United Kingdom, and Cherokee Nation. His work as a scenic designer, costume designer, stage director, and creative director, has taken him around the world, where he has created over 80 productions, including in Germany, Spain, Norway, Belgium, Denmark, Austria, Czech Republic, France, Ireland, Great Britain, Canada, U.S., China, Russia, and Saudi Arabia. In 2005, he won the European Opera Prize, which helped launch his career abroad. He earned a degree in engineering from The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art in New York City, and he received a Fulbright Fellowship to complete the Corso di Specializzazione per Scenografi Realizzatori at the Accademia Teatro alla Scala in Milan in 2001. In 2024, he debuted with the Opéra Royal de Wallonie-Liège a new La Traviata and returned to the NCPA Beijing for La Fanciulla del West. He also returned to direct and design a large-scale, open-air Aida at Austria’s Oper im Steinbruch Sankt Margarethen, where in 2021, he directed Turandot, which was seen by nearly 100,000 people in the historic quarry amphitheater near Vienna. He served as creative director for Riyadh Season Opening Parade Ceremonies in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, in October 2021. His production of Satyagraha, the first production of a Philip Glass opera in Russia, won the 2014 Bravo Award for Best Production and was awarded two Golden Mask Awards. Also in Ekaterinburg, he staged Weinberg’s The Passenger, which was also seen at Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow, and Martinu’s A Greek Passion in a new Russian translation.

Linda Pisano designs for many theater, dance, musical theater, ballet, and opera companies throughout the United States; her ballet designs have toured the U.K. and Canada. An award-winning designer, she was selected to represent the United States in costume design in the World Stage Design Exhibition in Taipei 2017. Her work has been twice selected for feature in the Quadrennial World Exhibition in Prague, and she is a three-time winner of the National Stage Expo for performance design and a four-time recipient of the Peggy Ezekiel Award for Excellence in Design. Her work was selected from top designers in the United States to be featured and published in the “Costumes of the Turn of the Century” exhibition with the Bakhrushin Museum in Moscow and the China Institute of Stage Design in Beijing. As professor of costume design at Indiana University, she also directs its Theatre and Drama study abroad program in London, is department chair, and produces IU’s Summer Theatre. She is coauthor of the recent books Art of the Character: Highlights from the Glenn Close Costume Collection and The Art and Practice of Costume Design. Some of her favorite projects include The Daughter of the Regiment, Anne Frank, Salome (with Patricia Racette), To Kill a Mockingbird, Romeo and Juliet, Sense and Sensibility, Chicago, Madama Butterfly, The Tragedy of Doctor Faustus, A Little Night Music, and the opera Akhnaten. She served two terms as an elected member of the board of directors for the United States Institute for Theatre Technology and is a member of United Scenic Artists, Local 829.

Recently, Driscoll Otto designed projections for a new production of Turandot (Bari Italy), lighting for the Encores! production of The Life, reimagined and directed by Billy Porter, lighting and projections for Chicago Opera Theatre’s production of Becoming Santa Claus, lighting and projections for Houston Grand Opera’s Marian’s Song, lighting for Turandot at Oper Im Steinbruch (Austria), projections for The Flying Dutchman (Florence and Bologna, Italy), and lighting and projections for Iolanta at Chicago Opera Theatre. Otto’s design work is seen frequently in NYC and in regional theater and opera. His credits include the Huntington Theatre Company, Utah Opera, Old Globe Theatre, Opera Omaha, Opera Philadelphia, Dallas Theater Center, Drury Lane Theatre, Dallas Opera, Chicago Opera Theatre, Houston Shakespeare Festival, Trinity Repertory Company, Hangar Theatre, Flat Rock Playhouse, Lyric Opera Kansas City, and productions of Legally Blonde and Rock of Ages for Norwegian Cruise Lines. Highlights in his resume include projection design for Santa Fe Opera’s production of The Golden Cockerel and the Metropolitan Opera’s production of La Donna del Lago. He earned an M.F.A. from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts.

Greg Emetaz is a filmmaker and video designer based in New York. His credits include, for stage: Champion and Fire Shut Up in My Bones, Metropolitan Opera; La Fanciulla del West, National Center for Performing Arts–Beijing; La Clemenza di Tito, LA Opera; Tristan und Isolde, Croatian National Theatre. World premieres of Bel Canto, Chicago Lyric Opera; Dolores Claiborne, San Francisco Opera; Champion, An American Soldier, Shalimar, 27, and The Golden Ticket, Opera Theatre of Saint Louis; Enemies, A Love Story, Palm Beach Opera. For screen: feature film Camp Wedding (Nevermore Audience Award, Jim Thorpe Best Comedy), short films Bowes Academy, Spell Claire, Get the FK Outta Paris!, Death by Omelette (SNCF Prix Du Polar finalist), and web series Do it Yourselfie (Friar’s Club special Jury Award, iTVfest Best Director award), codirected with Amanda DeSimone. He’s also served as video director for the 2008-11 NEA Opera Honors and 2011 and 2013 NEA Jazz Masters and created behind-the-scenes documentaries for Julie Taymor’s The Tempest, Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, and numerous productions at Opera Theatre of Saint Louis and New York City Opera.

Andrew Elliot is a makeup artist, wig designer, and stylist. His work can be seen with IU Jacobs Opera and Ballet Theater, Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, Indiana Repertory Theatre, Beef & Boards Dinner Theatre, Booth Tarkington Civic Theatre, Actors Theatre of Indiana, Phoenix Theatre, Zach & Zack Productions, Summer Stock Stage, and more. His work as a makeup artist and stylist can be seen locally and nationally in various publications, commercials, and editorials. The facade of the Palladium in Carmel, Indiana, showcases his work as a part of the Blockhouse Studios productions of Eos and Frost. He spent 2020 recreating icons of film, fashion, and theater, which gained national attention, with features in The New York Times, NowThis News, The Indianapolis Star, and Indianapolis Monthly.

Robin Hoover Allen is visiting lecturer in music in ballet and codirector of the Jacobs Academy Ballet Program at the IU Jacobs School of Music, where she has served as faculty since 2018. Her teaching responsibilities at the university level include ballet pedagogy and classical and contemporary ballet technique, and her area of special interest within the Jacobs Academy is teaching creative movement classes for young children with a pre-ballet focus. A certified yoga instructor, Allen also teaches Mindful Movement through Yoga, a class specifically for musicians that she developed for the Jacobs School. She is an alumna of IU and holds Bachelor of Science degrees in ballet and human biology, and a Master of Science degree in ballet.

Christian Claessens is lecturer in ballet at the IU Jacobs School of Music. He began his ballet training at the Conservatoire de la Monaie. In 1978, he came to New York on scholarship to the School of American Ballet and the American Ballet Theatre School. After graduating, he performed with the Kansas City Ballet and Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre. In 1984, he returned to Europe as a member of the Dutch National Ballet. As a soloist, Claessens toured internationally with Stars of the American Ballet, Stars of the New York City Ballet, Stars of the Hong Kong Ballet, and Kozlov and Friends. In 1991, he cofounded the Scarsdale Ballet Studio with Diana White. In 1999, he codirected the International Ballet Project with Valentina Kozlova and White, both of New York City Ballet. In 1998, he took over the directorship of the Purchase Youth Ballet. He was the director of La Leçon: Christian Claessens School of Ballet in Westchester, New York.

Rebecca Janes is visiting lecturer in music in ballet and codirector of the Jacobs Academy Ballet Program at the IU Jacobs School of Music. After a professional career spanning 20 years, dancing principal roles by George Balanchine, Alonzo King, Dwight Rhoden, Nacho Duato, Marius Petipa, Alvin Ailey, Twyla Tharp, Anthony Tudor, and Sasha Janes, she moved to Bloomington with her family. Before coming to Bloomington, Janes was part of the senior ballet faculty at Charlotte Ballet Academy. She has been teaching for nine years and is also on faculty at the Chautauqua Institution in New York.

Glenda Lucena is a world-renowned professional ballet teacher and repetiteur. She brings her insight, excellence, and spirituality into every studio. She has served as ballet master at Miami City Ballet, taught consistently for the Chautauqua Institution, and served as both faculty and repetiteur for the Jacobs School of Music Ballet Department.

Kyra Nichols is professor of ballet at the IU Jacobs School of Music, where she holds the Violette Verdy and Kathy Ziliak Anderson Chair in Ballet. Nichols began her early training with her mother, Sally Streets, a former member of New York City Ballet (NYCB). Nichols became an apprentice and then a member of the corps de ballet at NYCB in 1974 and was promoted to soloist in 1978. In 1979, George Balanchine promoted her to principal dancer, and she worked closely with both Balanchine and Jerome Robbins. She performed numerous leading roles in the NYCB repertoire, including Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto Number 2, Stars and Stripes, Liebeslieder Walzer, and Davidsbündlertänze. She has worked with an extensive list of choreographers, including William Forsythe, Susan Stroman, Christopher Wheeldon, Jacques D’Amboise, Robert La Fosse, and Robert Garland. Nichols retired from New York City Ballet in June 2007 after 33 years with the company, the longest-serving principal dancer in the company’s history. Immediately prior to joining the Jacobs School, she was ballet mistress at Pennsylvania Ballet.

Irina Ter-Grigoryan received her degrees of piano performance, pedagogy, and accompaniment in the former Soviet Union. She served as a faculty member at the Baku State Conservatory and as an accompanist for the Azerbaijan State Theater Opera and Ballet. She was selected from a small pool of musicians to accompany international and regional competitions representing the Soviet Union. During her time in the United States, she has continued her work as an accompanist with the Temple Square Concert Series Recitals in Salt Lake City, Utah; University of Utah; and Ballet West Co.; and as a collaborative pianist at DePauw University. She currently holds the position of accompanist and music director with the IU Jacobs School of Music Ballet Department.

Michael Vernon is professor of ballet at the IU Jacobs School of Music. He studied at the Royal Ballet School in London with Dame Ninette de Valois and Leonide Massine. He performed with The Royal Ballet, The Royal Opera Ballet, and the London Festival Ballet before moving to New York in 1976 to join the Eglevsky Ballet as ballet master and resident choreographer under the directorship of Edward Villella. Vernon served as artistic director of the company from 1989 to 1996. He has choreographed for the Eglevsky Ballet, BalletMet, and North Carolina Dance Theatre, and Mikhail Baryshnikov commissioned him to choreograph the pas de deux In a Country Garden for American Ballet Theatre (ABT). Vernon’s solo S’Wonderful was danced by ABT principal Cynthia Harvey in the presence of President and Mrs. Reagan and shown nationwide on CBS television. Vernon served as the assistant choreographer on Ken Russell’s movie Valentino, starring Rudolph Nureyev and Leslie Caron. Vernon has taught at Steps on Broadway (New York City) since 1980 and been a company teacher for American Ballet Theatre, Dance Theatre of Harlem, Metropolitan Opera Ballet, and Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater. He has been involved with the Ballet Program of the Chautauqua Institution since 1996 and is the artistic advisor for the Ballet School of Stamford. He is permanent guest teacher at the Manhattan Youth Ballet and has a long association with Ballet Hawaii. For Indiana University, Vernon has choreographed Endless Night, Jeux, Spectre de la Rose, and Cathedral, and has staged and provided additional choreography for the full-length classics Swan Lake and The Sleeping Beauty. He has choreographed for many IU Jacobs School of Music Opera Theater productions, such as Faust and the world premiere of Vincent.

Sarah Wroth is chair of the Ballet Department and associate professor of ballet at the IU Jacobs School of Music. She began her training at the Frederick School of Classical Ballet in Frederick, Maryland. In 2003, she earned a Bachelor of Science in Ballet Performance with an Outside Field in Education from the Jacobs School of Music. That same year, she joined Boston Ballet as a member of the corps de ballet. With the company, Wroth performed principal roles in works by William Forsythe, Jiri Kylian, Marius Petipa, Jerome Robbins, Helen Pickett, and Mikko Nissinen, and soloist roles in ballets by Sir Frederick Ashton, George Balanchine, and August Bournonville. She has performed with Boston Ballet internationally in Spain, England, South Korea, and Finland. In 2009, she was awarded the E. Virginia Williams Inspiration Award for her unwavering dedication to ballet and the Boston Ballet Company. Wroth earned a Master of Science in Nonprofit Management from Northeastern University in 2015 and retired from Boston Ballet in May 2017.