In 2017, as a result of a growing list of letters from audience members, to New York City Ballet's ballet master in chief Peter Martins reached out to us asking for assistance on how to modify the elements of Chinese caricature in George Balanchine's The Nutcracker.
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This article brings up a very important point that’s been present specifically in my life for many years. For four years, I was in the Moscow Ballet’s Great Russian Nutcracker every time it came around to Rochester. I was an angel, then a mouse, then a butterfly, then a Chinese variation. It wasn’t my finest moment, I can admit that. When I played a Chinese dancer in the Nutcracker I was probably around 11. So, no, I don’t think I knew any better, but the adults around me should have. My mom should have known that wasn’t ok, or my dance teacher should have. At the very least, the Moscow Ballet should have known better. In my case, I wasn’t in offensive make-up, but the principle still stands. This is an issue that extends from the top with the casting directors all the way to the actors who accept the roles. I think a common argument is that actors shouldn’t be blamed for accepting roles that are inherently offensive for them to play because they need the money. Unfortuantely for these actors, monetary gain isn’t an excuse to encourage racism in the industry and take roles from actors of color. There are really two ways this can be solved. White actors can refuse to take these roles, forcing casting directors to cast actors of color. Or, us as audiences could choose to not see shows that cast white actors in yellowface. Not that either of these things are easy, but we as performers and consumers need to decide what’s truly important to us.
This article made me very disappointed but hopeful at the same time. As a Chinese person speaking, I haven’t seen authentic representation of Chinese culture on stage/screen produced by Western media. I’ve kind of given up in hoping there would be any representation that would satisfy me. But I’m so happy to see the New York City ballet be WILLING to make the first step to hire out professionals and legitimately try to eliminate yellowface and Asian stereotypes from their program. Now let me go on a full rant about this even though no one asked for it. With The Nutcracker specifically, I agree with the authors of the article that yes, get rid of the yellowface. It’s offensive using makeup to “dress up” as a different race. You don’t need to cast only asians for the roles either. The scene alludes to Chinese culture. IT’S ABOUT THE CULTURE AND CHARACTERS NOT RACE. As to to fingers choreography. I don’t even understand what’s going on? I saw the pictures and at first I thought the dancers were imitating Chinese Opera hand gestures or Buddhist hand gestures (Buddhism isn’t even Chinese). But nope, chopsticks? With costumes too. It frustrates me that the costumes are just “seemingly” Chinese. They all allude to the Qing period dress with the Manchus but the props don’t allude to any period at all? We don’t need these “Chinese characteristics” to convey the sense of culture. Just be consistent with the designs! This entire segment of the Nutcracker can be fixed by approaching all aspects of the scene not as a decoration but rather a genuine representation of Chinese culture. There’s more to the art than just the scene looking Chinese. This might help if designers/choreographers/directors actually did research or hired someone who actually knows the culture, as some companies are doing! Also side note with the language of the article and just asian stereotypes in general, I don't like that people make China equivalent to "Asia". Chinese people are Asians but not all Asian people are Chinese...It's confusing to say cast an Asian person because that could literally mean casting someone from East Asia or casting someone from the Middle East. We don't appreciate the umbrella term!
This is a really important article for every company that puts on the Nutcracker to see. As a huge holiday classic, it is easy to perpetuate stereotypes across the second act of this show where different cultures are portrayed in short dance segments. I have seen this show every year for as long as I can remember, as my sister was a dancer and then I went on to start working on the show for a dance company in my community. Sitting and watching the second act has always been uncomfortable for me. Portraying Chinese with bright reds and oranges in the lighting in the costumes while using more oranges and greens to portray Arabian. It was all just stereotypical representations of these cultures that needs to end. Dance Magazine is describing a real issue here with producing classics like the nutcracker. It is amazing that they created the pledge to eliminate Asian stereotypes from the stage and that major dance companies have signed on. I hope that this has a very positive impact on the way cultures are represented on ballet stages across the world.
When I saw an article about how to improve inclusivity especially for Asians/Chinese people, I was ecstatic. I am not now, in fact, I am disappointed in this article, angry even. From a broader standpoint, I do agree that there is much work to be done with phasing out caricature in the Nutcracker and other forms of live theater, but "outdated racial stereotypes" is such a euphemism; we can call it what it is: racist humiliation that no one's bothered to do anything about for too long. Now to certain points within the article.
1. Under normal circumstances, I would not put racial slurs in a published article, like "chinaman" and "coolie." However, one of the writers does appear to be Chinese, so I suppose he gets a pass for it.
2. I understand there is an argument to be made for not casting an Asian actor for the dance portion, and I see it. Sometimes it is about culture and the beauty of it, not race. However, it is my firm belief that if each culture represented in the Nutcracker is played by a different actor, the actor's race/ethnicity should adhere to that of the one being performed. There is already too little representation for people of color, how can we rob them of what little they have with a white man half-assedly bobbing his head and twirling his sleeves? I think directors absolutely should feel pressure to cast true to race, otherwise, there will be no pressure to be more inclusive. On the other hand, I would be in support of one single dancer (or two, in the case of the version of the nutcracker I saw) played through all of the cultures while utilizing quick changes and upholding the principle of cultural costumes, makeup, and physicality without being stereotypical or otherwise racist.
3. Dancing fortune cookies? Really? First of all, I applaud the costume designer who can make that look elegant. Second, fortune cookies were popularized in America as a dessert in Chinese restaurants, but there is no deeply rooted tradition in China about consuming fortune cookies, which aren't even Chinese in origin! The earliest form of what resembles a fortune cookie originated in Japan and included sesame and miso instead of vanilla and butter. There is some debate regarding the first appearance of the fortune cookie in America, but that does not negate the fact that its advent was from Japan. For this, I am severely disappointed in Phil Chan (the author).
While I appreciate the effort made to ameliorate the racism in the Nutcracker and the New York City Ballet, this was, all in all, a somewhat dispiriting article to read.
I think that this article brings up a point that is long overdue for being reviewed. The use of east Asian stereotypes not only in The Nutcracker but in western media in general is an extremely large problem. For one, no one country in east Asia is the same; in terms of culture, language, history, or physical appearance. That we, as westerners, make assumptions based upon a generalised construct that we - for the most part - do not entirely comprehend is ludicrous. Unfortunately, it is also a fact that it happens. The article does make a good point that, in the casting of dancers, the directors and choreographers need not necessarily cast those who are “Asian or Asian-passing” but that fault lies in creating a non-Asian person into a caricature of a stereotypical eastern Asian person. The conveyance of Chinese culture (which, I believe, is the intent of the dance - not some muddled, westernized version of “generalised” eastern Asian cultures) can entirely be represented through cohesive design processes without the need for anything offensive.
I love the ending of this article. The article did not demonize anyone and embraced ballet masters and other high ups in ballet institutions that are asking for help making The Nutcracker more inclusive. It ended with the sentiment that we need to evaluate what we are doing and change it for the better. I also loved how this article gave solutions that small ballet studios could do on their own. Solutions like modifying makeup and rechoreographing certain parts are easy and doable for smaller studios. Hopefully smaller studios as well as bigger companies will listen to the article and start enacting change. I’m not familiar with how ballet studios work, but I wonder if there is a way for students to help and encourage studios to make these changes. This way studios that might resist can be persuaded by the people, both parents and students, that are paying them for dance training.
I have done maybe 8 Nutcrackers over the years, and portions of the second act have always bothered me. I eventually learned (not being a person who has any dance training or history) that Nutcracker choreography differs across productions, although most U.S. based companies model one of a few famous American choreographies. The music certainly lends itself to a sort of world tour of dance, but it does not necessitate it; there are plenty of alternative choreographies that do not use stereotypes or even cultural appropriation. This article suggests a number of approaches to improve the popular choreography, but even then the “world tour” still feels like a kind of voyeuristic exoticism. In my opinion, it is time to put that approach to bed and explore new choreographies that do not come with an asterisk. However, I think that this departure would come with an initial decline in commercial success, and many ballet companies and schools rely on income from their Nutcrackers.
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