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The Chocolate Nutcracker comes to life at Ruth Eckerd Hall this weekend, the vision of a 12-year-old girl who wanted someday to choreograph a multicultural version of the classical ballet.
By LORRI HELFAND
© St. Petersburg Times, published December 13, 2001
The Chocolate Nutcracker, like the original Nutcracker ballet, is about a little girl's dream.
But first, it was the dream of LaVerne Reed, 51, the play's writer and artistic director. When she was 12 years old, the talented dancer trained at the Pennsylvania Ballet and was cast as a mouse and a soldier in the Nutcracker. She longed to play the lead role, but, as an African-American, Reed believed it would be a long time before she fit the dance world's vision of Clara, the European girl who dreams of a Nutcracker prince.
"When I become a choreographer, I'm going to write my own version and have a diversified cast," Reed recalled telling herself.
Ten years ago, Reed put her ideas into action and wrote The Chocolate Nutcracker, which was performed for the first time in 1993 in Los Angeles. It has become a recent tradition at Clearwater's Ruth Eckerd Hall, where it will be performed by a cast of professional dancers and 150 local children and teens Friday evening and Saturday morning.
Not only is The Chocolate Nutcracker's lead, Claire, a woman of color, but the entire production converts the classical ballet into a multicultural celebration. The journey begins in 1950s Harlem and takes Claire through Africa, Cuba and Egypt with surreal stops in Gospel Land, the Snake Pit, the Rain Forest and the Land of Funk. Along the way, the traditional ballet is spiced with a blend of jazz, tap, hip-hop, African and Afro-Cuban influences.
In Reed's play, Claire receives a chocolate nutcracker instead of a wooden one. Reed said her choice of chocolate was twofold, symbolizing the brown skin of people of African descent and the treat's universal appeal, which connects youngsters of all cultures.
It's a message that hits home with dancer Chandra Ford, 18, of St. Petersburg.
"The Chocolate Nutcracker is about being able to share our history and culture and being able to come together as people of different races and cultures and backgrounds," she said.
For the fourth season, Monica Richardson, 18, a graduate of the New World School of the Arts in Miami, portrays Claire. As a young woman of Cuban and Trinidadian roots, Richardson relishes the opportunity to play Claire. "It's amazing because you don't get to see that in the regular Nutcracker," said Richardson, who has been dancing for 15 years.
Choreographer Vincent Bingham, 27, portrays Uncle Al (Drosselmeyer in the original). Bingham, who starred in the Tony Award-winning Bring in Da Noise, Bring in Da Funk, is a former student of Reed and the production's resident director, Paulette W. Johnson. In the party scene, he smoothly taps and glides his magical feet across the stage to Duke Ellington's Nutcracker Suite as revelers swing and do the jig.
Performers at a rehearsal Sunday at John Hopkins Middle School in St. Petersburg called The Chocolate Nutcracker "contagious" because once they came on board they were hooked.
Johnson has been involved with the production for five years. On a visit to Washington, D.C., she met with Reed, her former dance teacher at Howard University, who convinced her to check out a rehearsal of the play. She eagerly signed on as assistant director of the Miami production, and the next year, she brought The Chocolate Nutcracker to the Tampa Bay area.
The audience will likely find the kinetic energy of The Chocolate Nutcracker contagious as well, from the lyrical rain forest ballet to the robust tribal rhythms of West Africa.
In addition to Clearwater, the play is performed in seven cities from Los Angeles to Washington, D.C., and Reed travels to each locale to oversee productions from audition to performance.
While she maintains artistic control, The Chocolate Nutcracker varies at each location depending on the resident director's vision and predominant community cultures, Reed said.
Only the Tampa Bay production features the Land of Funk, thanks to Johnson's enthusiasm. Last year, Johnson petitioned her mentor to add the funky scene, laden with hip-hop, pelvic thrusts and breakdancing.
Aside from multicultural inclusion, Reed thrives on nurturing young talent.
For example, Reed created the Frog Prince role especially for Spencer Hedges, a 9-year-old Clearwater boy, because of the talent and enthusiasm she has seen in him since he joined the cast two years ago.
"I never stop dancing at my house," Spencer says. "I just never quit."
The children in the production have been working on it since a casting call in September, at which everyone who turned out was accepted.
"No one is turned away. Even if you come in with two left feet, it's okay," Reed said.
The community production, presented by the PACT Institute at Ruth Eckerd Hall, gives young people an opportunity to work with professionals and showcase their talents.
And that opportunity has taught dancers such as Anye Cole, 17, of Tampa, to shine.
"It's more than steps and movements," she said. "It's about feeling what you're doing, because if you don't feel it, then the audience isn't going to feel it either."
The Chocolate Nutcracker, Friday at 7:30 p.m. and Saturday at 10 a.m., Ruth Eckerd Hall, Clearwater. Friday tickets are $17; Saturday tickets are $10. (727) 791-7400.