Nutcracker Baryshnikov Kirkland 2act, part 4 Grand Pas de Deux

[lesleynaughty]

Didnt Misha want to remake this as a psychological drama?

[Marteixtas]

The most beautiful version of this ballet! Baryshnikov and Kirkland was fantastic!!! I love them!!

[tld2835]

Goosebumps... STILL!! after all these years!

[darlaandme47]

I completely agree with hogwartsjedi, this version of The Nutcracker has always been my favorite, although it's quite old. However the way the Pas de Deux is set up as a struggle to stay with her prince vs. going home with her uncle gives soooo much more meaning and powerful feelings to go along with the best arangement in the whole story! scottmifismyhero your comment surprised me that you were even on this site! Unless of course someone with much different taste than you made you watch it?!!

[veramentegina]

Gelsey!! what a lovely creature!! her dancing leaves me breathless. nobody like her. ever.

[beatleschica319]

Tears.

[hogwartsjedi]

I absolutely adore this version of the pas de deux. In every stage performance of the Nutcracker I've seen, it's always danced between the Sugar Plum Fairy and either 'her prince' or the Nutcracker. This is the only one I've seen between Clara and the Nutcracker with Uncle Drosselmeyer. It's so much more dramatic and makes the music all the more powerful, the way he tries to pull them apart. BEAUTIFUL!

[Prancer1231]

@hogwartsjedi yeah, I thought sugar plum fairy and prince were supposed to do it

[pangles16]

Phenomenal!

[LEDANCETHERAPY]

Her arm are so soft they are full of love. omg incredible feeling. So great to have this nutcracker performance to revel at, I could watch it over and over again.

[siamorevida]

Lindo D+

[ajudge9628]

beautiful dancing. baryshnikov's turning leaps are just... agh... incredible. i find gelsey to be almost distractingly thin though. how on earth does she manage to supports herself on those toothpick legs? but the pas de duex is almost painfully gorgeous and her extensions are fantastic.

[uclmu2008]

This is divine. I usually find this particular ballet a tad silly (and a bit creepy), because many ballerinas don't really get the little girl across without inadvertent, weird Tim Burton undertones, but this absolutely had me holding my breath. Lovely, really. Thank you for posting.

[DocDLH]

Two of the greatest technical and lyrical dancers of all time. Enchanting.

[NinjaTree6]

this is the only reason i know what ballet IS. my mom had me watching this before i could even walk. if not for this, i never would have even started ballet.

[saritamia78]

@NinjaTree6 Yep, same here. :)

[cwandcy]

stunning! I have to say I had a tear! this is so perfect and beautiful. not only is the music very dramatic, but these are my two favorite dancers! I love this!

[nitaseyboldsault]

sublime

[Marteixtas]

Baryshnikov montou essa versão, inverteu algumas passagens, fez uma transformação enorme nesse ballet e resultou na versão mais bonita do Quebra Nozes que eu já vi. Fugiu do tradicional mas ficou belísssimo!

[classicfilmgirl]

Could you imagine dancing with him? That would be quite an experience

[classicfilmgirl]

He and Gelsey were in love, but he broke her heart, very sad, they were both such sublime dancers

[evret0503]

.44 Kirkland is simply amazing as she whirls across the floor!

[jnhondaysgrandson]

is clara dancing the sugar plum fairy variation!? it is strange! :P

[neverlandbrats]

This production is FAR closer to the novel than any other ballet version. Although Drosselmyer is still not who he is in the book...the over all story is much much better and it focuses on Clara/Marie and her love for the Nutcracker. This scene is utterly heartbreaking. The longing between the two of them is so so sad. I saw this when I was VERY small and it made me cry even then. It's just BEAUTIFUL. Sugar plum faerie & cavalier dance ever felt the same. This one is by far the most beautiful.

[samo314159]

Baryshnikov: What part of "Pas de Deux" don't you understand, Uncle Vanya?

[cubanmiamiboy]

Why...I wonder WHYYYY the killing of the storyline??!?!. THIS WAS NEVER MEANT TO BE DANCED BY CLARA!!! THIS IS THE SUGAR PLUM FAIRY PDD!! ABT doesn't have a REAL Nutcracker-(Fedorova's faithful version was dropped way before Misha's attempt)...NYCB has Balanchine's truncated version-(his own, sans male variation)...little by little Petipa's choreography is getting forgotten. Thanks to Sir Peter Wright for the RB and Mme Alonso for BNC this precious jewel is still alive. Gelsey is beautiful IMO

[al1936ful]

@cubanmiamiboy The plot has not been killed, only slightly changed, and it has been done to allow Clara and the prince to dance more. It makes perfect sense and turns it into more of a love story between the two. And Baryshnikov, BTW, was not the first (nor the last) to do it this way.

[BernardProfitendieu]

@cubanmiamiboy if you want the true storyline go read the Hoffmann tale it's based upon - you'll see that NO version follows the original (that'll REALLY give you something to get your knickers in a twist about!!)

why not enjoy each version for what it offers? they all have their strong points! - this ABT pas de trois is magnificent, I think.

[cubanmiamiboy]

@BernardProfitendieu

I'm not arguing against the authenticity of the ballet storyline vs. Hoffman's tale. Of course we have discrepancies there. My point is based on how destroyed the original Vsevolozhsky's libretto gets in this version-(and many others)-along with Petipa's choreography which, again, would be just totally forgotten if Wright and Alonso would not had kept it in their companies.

[cubanmiamiboy]

The same can be said about characters modification-(can we imagine if suddenly some choreographers decide to change the swans of Swan Lake into, let's say, frogs...?). Well, this happened to the majority of the current Nutcracker productions.

[cubanmiamiboy]

Act II should open with a parade of dolls, which are the Nutcracker's sisters, welcoming him and Clara to the Sweets Kingdom-(see Alonso's production for this detail). All those modern angels were nowhere to be found in the original libretto-(making the Kingdom of Sweets into some kind of heaven...(Oh, Lord...!)

[samo314159]

@cubanmiamiboy Missing the forest for the trees there, buddy. Enjoy beauty where it chooses to manifest itself!

[katiag81]

One of the best interpretations of this part of the ballet...Both are amazing...

[qhqhe008]

Wonderful!!!!!!!!!!!!

[DarkFairyWinx98]

This is only balet!

I was on balet, where was on ice.

[BernardProfitendieu]

only?!?

who wants to see a boring ice show?

[iancas]

gelsey....stunning!!