Steven Trumon Gray and Laura Careless






Robyne: Hi, I’m Robyne,Wesley: and I’m Wesley,Robyne: and this is, Obstructed View.Wesley: Today we will be discussing Company XIV’s production of Nutcracker Rouge.  It is a loose adaptation of Tchaikovsky’s classical ballet, The Nutcracker.Robyne: We will link to a plot synopsis of The Nutcracker in our show notes.Wesley: So let’s begin with design.With set and costume design we have Zane Pihlstrom.  With lighting design we have Jeanette Oi-Suko Yew.  And with makeup design we have Sarah Cimino.Robyne: As with Cinderella the design elements of this show were beautiful.  The production reused the set from Cinderella. So the false proscenium that is set at an angle halfway upstage was used as a curtain system for the show.  There was a traveling carousel piece, that has a mounted pole dancers pole on top of it, that is used in the production.  As well as various dressing table backstage, that are seen through the curtain at certain points of the production, and various onstage lighting elements including a chandelier. Wesley: There is very little variation in set construction from Cinderella to this production, which is to be expected.  The main set pieces remain the same.  I found though to be a bit underused in comparison to Cinderella where it felt like an essential player in the performance.Robyne: AgreedWesley: One of the things that you will notice in this production, as compared to Cinderella, or my previous experience with Nutcracker Rouge, is that there was a lot more illusion happening in terms of use of curtain blocking scenic shifts, and blocking your access to backstage action.  Maybe it’s just a difference from where we were seated, but I found there to be a lot more reveals happening of the special effects, rather than the effects just walking onto stage. Robyne:  It felt like the curtain separated us from the world they were creating, as opposed to Cinderella, where the world was outside of this proscenium that they had created on stage.  There was a lot less of an interaction with it, with the dancers, in that ethereal sense.  To be fair, this piece was much more frantic and fast paced so it was a lot less of a lounge feel for that.Wesley: The points at which aspects of lighting and set were allowed to take center stage were great.  Certain aspects have been enlarged for this production, given the Minetta Lane Theatre allows for that, but it was so fast paced.  Whereas in Cinderella I could find certain aspects of it and really let them sit with me for a moment.  I could become just as enthralled with the way the light touches a chandelier as I could with a person’s body.  Here, if I wanted those moments of stillness, those moments of quiet, I had to scrape for them. Robyne: Right.Wesley: They were there! They were there in design.  But we weren’t given much access to them as audience members.Robyne: The costume design was the only aspect of this production that I enjoyed more than I did in Cinderella.  It was absolutely exquisite and completely in my mind justifies the lack of additions to the set because that is not where their energy and financial resources went clearly.  The costumes were gorgeous.  The dresses, the various candy pieces were all beautiful.Wesley: I totally agree.  I think this was better than the previous Nutcracker Rouge I saw. Better than Cinderella.  The costumes were divine. They found that edge between baroque operatic, and drag, and they ran across it and it was beautiful.  The narrator, her various looks, I don’t know how she got into dress after dress after dress but she did and it looked like it was done with such ease.Robyne: The only benefit I give them to the speed of the production an