Urban Nutcracker (1998)

Urban Nutcracker was a multi-year project with the Cleveland School for the Arts in which the traditions of The Nutcracker were replaced with more recognizable elements from the lives of young people in Cleveland in the 1990’s: basketballs instead of sugar plums, a main character named Miesha instead of Maria, and a magical uncle styled more after MC Hammer than Count Drosselmeyer. 

Urban Nutcracker grew over the course of six years. Each year, the number of collaborators grew, drawing in dancers and designers from the Pilobolus network. With each iteration, the performance became more refined and drew bigger crowds. By the final year, the show had a run of 19 performances, including early morning shows for school groups and three weekend evening shows. 

Collective Creativity: The Making of Urban Nutcracker

What started as a one-week workshop at the Cleveland School of the Arts (CSA) evolved into a multi-year project. The collaboration was initiated by Eugenia Strauss, then development director at CSA, and funded by the school’s board of directors. Eugenia had heard Alison had created a Nutcracker for a ballet company in Strasbourg that had woven together music by Tchaikovsky and Duke Ellington. As the two began talking, the idea of creating an original Urban Nutcracker emerged and the project came into being, evolving slowly with support from so many unusual organizations and people. The project became a model for the way Apogee Arts develops larger community-based works over the course of several years.

Explore Urban Nutcracker

For additional information, please contact director@apogeearts.org.