The Nutcracker itself if a beautiful Christmas tale, full of snow, Christmas trees, presents and a general feeling of the excitement of Christmas. It is based on a story by E T A Hoffman, which was later adapted and then chosen by Tchaikovsky and Lev Ivanov to produce the very famous Nutcracker ballet.
The Artistic Director Tony Mercer has brought this tale to the ice. It was spectacular. The ice skating in such a confined place and still being able to create speed and height had you holding your breath. I felt that we should have applauded more, but then I think we could have clapped from start to finish.
You know that this is going to be something special when you have ice skaters like Evgeny Platov four-time figure skating World Champion and dual Olympic gold medalist and Maxim Staviski dual World Champion on stage.
The staging and costumes were brilliant, everything you would expect from a big production. I particularly liked the scene with the mice when the the set suddenly became huge to show that the mice were small.
It was a pity that it wasn't playing for longer in Sydney. It is a production that everybody would enjoy particularly children. There was lots of humour, even magic tricks and fire stick dancing. Even if you are not into ice skating you will still admire this production, they made it look so easy when in reality just one small slip could end in disaster. It received a well deserved standing ovation from the majority of the audience.
If you missed it in Sydney you can catch them in Canberra 13 - 17 June, 20 - 24 June Brisbane then it will head to NZ before returning to Adelaide 19 - 22 July, 25 - 29 July in Melbourne, 2 - 12 August in Perth.
For more info visit there website - www.imperialicestars.com
