What’s the benefit of taking a dance class, especially as a kid?
I really think that dance education provides so much more than just moving your body to music. It’s about really learning the value of self-expression and creativity and hard work. And I also really believe that it instills these really important life skills as well; like perseverance, discipline and teamwork. These are things that, even the dancers that we have now, if they decide not to pursue dance in their future, they will still have those really important life skills to take them on to college and the workforce.
You’ve been Opus’ director for about nine years. When did the ‘Nutcracker’ tradition come about?
When I first started at Opus, we were a pretty small school, and I wanted to make sure that when we decided to do a Nutcracker that we were ready for it, and it was the right time, too. So 2018 was our very first ‘Nutcracker.’
Why does ‘The Nutcracker’ keep audiences and dancers so engaged, year after year?
What is so, I don’t know, compelling about ‘The Nutcracker’ is the sense of magic that it brings to it, and that’s something that the audience experiences. It’s something that the students really experience. And I know that when I was a young dancer — I think I was 5 or 6 years old — and my character was a gumdrop, and we had this moment where the Sugar Plum Fairy came over and bowed to us in like these little groups of, like, three or four kids. I remember that sense of magic for me, that, like the Sugar Plum Fairy was bowing to me, and how big of a deal that felt in that moment.
What else makes Opus’ performance of ‘The Nutcracker’ unique?
Marie Christenson, she hand-makes all the tutus and all the costumes. Like, there’s over 300 costume pieces in the show, and she has had her fingers on every thread and every piece of fabric … Each tutu that you see on stage takes, like, over 40 hours to construct.
Tell me about this year’s cast.
… We’ve got 170 students this year, which is like 40 more students than I think we’ve ever had. [But] I think the biggest thing for me, with putting ‘The Nutcracker’ together, is the sense of community that comes with it. When we’re teaching from week to week, we’re teaching specific age groups and specific levels, and they don’t really get to intermingle very much. But with ‘The Nutcracker,’ we have advanced students that are working with 10-year-olds or 5-year-olds, and it really brings this strong sense of community together and that sense of teamwork.
What do you do if a kid gets stage fright?
We talk about it in a way, that’s, you know: ‘You’ve prepared for this. You’re ready for this. You know exactly what you’re doing. This is why we rehearse, and this is just one more rehearsal that you’re going to go out there and do …. And as soon as you get out on that stage, you’ll forget how nervous you are,’ which usually happens. And then they come back after their dance, and they’re just so proud of themselves, and they’re just glowing with pride.
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