The Curse of Clara and her sugar-plum dreams
The Nutcracker role takes centre stage in animated film featuring Phil Esposito
There’s a reason ballet-world insiders call it “the Curse of the Claras.” Most of the 60 aspiring young dancers who played the charming little girl in the National Ballet of Canada’s annual festive-season production of The Nutcracker dreamed they would go on as adults to play the leading role of the Sugar Plum Fairy. Only one ever did. And now the tale of the curse has been turned into an entertaining half-hour animated film, The Curse of Clara: A Holiday Tale, which had its premiere on CBC Television last week and will air again at 5:30 p.m. on Christmas Day.
It’s based on a story by Vickie Fagan, who played Clara in 1972, and decades later wrote and published a short story about the curse.
At this point I must add a point of Clara-fication.
In 1995, when James Kudelka’s new version replaced Celia Franca’s 1964 version, the name of the character was changed from Clara to Marie.
Elena Lobsanova, a Russian-born dancer who had played Marie while training at the National Ballet School, became the only dancer ever to break the curse. She played the Sugar Plum Fairy in 2011, having become one of the stars of the National Ballet of Canada.
Tchaikovsky’s Russian bonbon of a dance spectacle became a festiveseason craze for North America when George Balanchine’s version opened in New York in 1954.
Ten years later, on Dec. 26, 1964, Franca’s version had its premiere at the O’Keefe Centre (as it was then known) in Toronto. After more than three decades, it was retired to make way for Kudelka’s new Nutcracker.
The cartoon yarn on television is set in 1972, when Fagan — then a 12-year-old girl from Niagara Falls — was one of two National Ballet School students sharing the role of Clara. It’s part of the fable that she was a huge fan of Phil Esposito, the hockey player who spoke of “giving 150 per cent” for Canada against Russia in the proudly remembered 1972 Summit Series.
“Playing Clara was every girl’s dream,” Fagan told me the other day.
“I knew every step of the part before I was cast. While doing it, you’re living in a fantasy world and afterwards it’s hard to go back to real life.”
She was chosen by Betty Oliphant, the formidable queen of the ballet school. And there’s a strict, sarcastic instructor in the film (with the voice of Sara Botsford) who reminded me of the late Miss O.
Among the stars of the company playing the Sugar Plum Fairy that year were Karen Kain and Veronica Tennant. It’s a plus that Kain does the voice of her own character, while Esposito does his voice, and that Tennant was a key figure in the new film as a producer and creative consultant.
Fagan left the ballet school, returning to Niagara Falls to attend a normal school. Later she worked freelance as a contemporary dancer for a decade before hanging up her dancing shoes and getting a job in TV production.
Fagan and Tennant were collaborating on making a film based on Fagan’s short story about her shattered dream. Tennant suggested that, given the mixture of fantasy and reality, animation might work better than live action.
They found a perfect partner in Jonas Diamond, executive producer of Smiley Guy Studios, who not only brought in his team of animators and designers; his brother and business partner, Jeremy Diamond, collaborated with Fagan on creating and writing the TV version of her short story.
Given the combination of hockey and Nutcracker, CBC Television was eager to get involved. And the always delightful Sheila McCarthy signed on as narrator.
Over the years the National Ballet of Canada has had a mind-boggling 1,369 performances of The Nutcracker, including 469 of the current Kudelka production, now enjoying its 20th anniversary. The last of this season’s 24 performances will be on Jan. 3.
This time, four aspiring 11- and 12-year-olds are sharing the role of Marie, the 10-year-old character called Clara in other versions.
And here’s a staggering statistic. The Nutcracker accounts for 29 per cent of the company’s total boxoffice revenue for this fiscal year and slightly more than 10 per cent of its $33-million annual operating budget. mknelman@thestar.ca.