Pittsburgh Arts, Regional Theatre, New Work, Producing, Copyright, Labor Unions,
New Products, Coping Skills, J-O-Bs...
Theatre industry news, University & School of Drama Announcements, plus occasional course support for
Carnegie Mellon School of Drama Faculty, Staff, Students, and Alumni.
CMU School of Drama
Friday, February 03, 2023
The Chocolate Nutcracker Is Coming to Pittsburgh with African Dance and a Modernized Story
Pittsburgh Magazine: Pittsburgh is about to get a Nutcracker unlike any traditional version the city may have seen before, performed in African dance by an all-Black cast.
“The Chocolate Nutcracker,” with two shows set for Saturday, in honor of Black History Month, is a contemporary adaptation of the classic tale.
4 comments:
Jackson Underwood
said...
Hearing that there is a production of the Nutcracker with an all black cast and African dance is so exciting to me. One of my favorite things about theatre and performance in general is that we can take something that is traditionally very white dominated like ballet and completely reimagine it. I bet many people would never believe that African dance and ballet could go together, yet here it is. I bet this production will be a wonderful display of culture and black joy. For the children that are in the production, this must have been a one of a kind experience. I hope they all took pride in the fact that they were doing something that had never been done before. Artistic director Norma Jean Barnes said she wanted the children to come out of the experience with a sense of hope, and I am confident that they will.
This is such an exciting news. I have been watching various different versions of Nutcracker since a child and it has been such as important part of my life. The Chocolate Nutcracker starting its performance in February is such an interesting yet meaningful choice. Not only it celebrates the Black History Month and embracing the culture, it also brings a nostalgic and innovating idea that Christmas productions are no longer limited to the Christmas season that it can be enjoyed by people all the time. I was very fortunate to be involved in my middle school’s theater production of Nutcracker. Within the production, I was helping the setting crew with finding materials and elements that would suit the story. For the story, it was also a modification where it happened in Asia and that the characters went through journey that could relate to the audience. This modification for targeted audience is smart and intriguing.
This is such an awesome thing to hear. not only that the Nutcracker is being brought to Pittsburgh with an All African-American cast, but also that they're modernizing the story, and showing the Nutcracker in a time other than right around Christmas. Although I was never in the Nutcracker myself ( the Academy I was at just never had it until it was a little too late for me), The Nutcracker was still something that had a pretty big meeting to me growing up. It signified the Holiday season for those of us who spent most of our afternoons in the ballet studio. Although bringing diversity to casts wasn't as big an issue where I was ( the cast was limited to whoever danced in that specific studio, as the dance scene on Maui isn't insanely huge), I think it's awesome that companies are bringing diversity and inclusion into their casts. I hope that I get a chance to see this production, but if not I'm sure that they did a phenomenal job with it.
It's always really interesting and exciting to see modern takes on classic stories. The Nutcracker is a story that most everyone is familiar with, but this will give us a new perspective on it - and that's what we should be doing with a lot of older plays. There are so few old plays and performance pieces that don't revolve around things that are typically white dominated. It's one thing to create a new piece of work that can focus on Black culture and, in this case, dance, but reworking something that everyone is familiar with is even more meaningful. It's heartwarming to see that Barnes created this play with the intention of empowering Black children after seeing what an effect it had in New York. It's things like this that really bring out the way that society still promotes very 'white' things, and we have to work to make them inclusive.
4 comments:
Hearing that there is a production of the Nutcracker with an all black cast and African dance is so exciting to me. One of my favorite things about theatre and performance in general is that we can take something that is traditionally very white dominated like ballet and completely reimagine it. I bet many people would never believe that African dance and ballet could go together, yet here it is. I bet this production will be a wonderful display of culture and black joy. For the children that are in the production, this must have been a one of a kind experience. I hope they all took pride in the fact that they were doing something that had never been done before. Artistic director Norma Jean Barnes said she wanted the children to come out of the experience with a sense of hope, and I am confident that they will.
This is such an exciting news. I have been watching various different versions of Nutcracker since a child and it has been such as important part of my life. The Chocolate Nutcracker starting its performance in February is such an interesting yet meaningful choice. Not only it celebrates the Black History Month and embracing the culture, it also brings a nostalgic and innovating idea that Christmas productions are no longer limited to the Christmas season that it can be enjoyed by people all the time. I was very fortunate to be involved in my middle school’s theater production of Nutcracker. Within the production, I was helping the setting crew with finding materials and elements that would suit the story. For the story, it was also a modification where it happened in Asia and that the characters went through journey that could relate to the audience. This modification for targeted audience is smart and intriguing.
This is such an awesome thing to hear. not only that the Nutcracker is being brought to Pittsburgh with an All African-American cast, but also that they're modernizing the story, and showing the Nutcracker in a time other than right around Christmas. Although I was never in the Nutcracker myself ( the Academy I was at just never had it until it was a little too late for me), The Nutcracker was still something that had a pretty big meeting to me growing up. It signified the Holiday season for those of us who spent most of our afternoons in the ballet studio. Although bringing diversity to casts wasn't as big an issue where I was ( the cast was limited to whoever danced in that specific studio, as the dance scene on Maui isn't insanely huge), I think it's awesome that companies are bringing diversity and inclusion into their casts. I hope that I get a chance to see this production, but if not I'm sure that they did a phenomenal job with it.
It's always really interesting and exciting to see modern takes on classic stories. The Nutcracker is a story that most everyone is familiar with, but this will give us a new perspective on it - and that's what we should be doing with a lot of older plays. There are so few old plays and performance pieces that don't revolve around things that are typically white dominated. It's one thing to create a new piece of work that can focus on Black culture and, in this case, dance, but reworking something that everyone is familiar with is even more meaningful. It's heartwarming to see that Barnes created this play with the intention of empowering Black children after seeing what an effect it had in New York. It's things like this that really bring out the way that society still promotes very 'white' things, and we have to work to make them inclusive.
Post a Comment