English National Ballet’s Nutcracker: a box of confectionary delights

London Coliseum
December 17, 2025

It does look absolutely terrific. It brims with colour and life at every turn. And with co-choreographers Aaron S. Watkin and Arielle Smith bringing a light touch to the story and dance, it’s certainly an easy on the eye couple of hours. It is a ballet where the designs have a tendency to trump the choreography, however.

After opening in Drosselemyer’s sweet shop, the viewer is whisked off to designer Dick Bird’s picture-perfect Edwardian London street scene with St Paul’s in the background. It feels wonderfully apt. It’s also very animated. There’s a lot of dancing, and what looks like more than one reference to well-known musicals. Deliberate or otherwise it’s impossible not to think Mary Poppins and Dick van Dyke when the two sweeps appear. Their dance with the young Clara (the excellent Heather Bain) in which they make clever use of their broomsticks is rather inventive. And then there’s Uromys Grimsewer, who has a face just like that, and the bunch of pickpocketing urchins. Oliver Twist, anyone?

As that line from the ‘Chim Chim Cher-ee’ goes, it all adds up to feeling, “Like somethin’ is brewin’ and ’bout to begin.”

Thereon, English National Ballet’s Nutcracker delivers much what you would expect in terms of narrative. The Stahlbaum’s party moves along nicely if not especially excitingly with plenty of foretastes and hints of what is to come in Act Two’s Land of Sweets and Dreams. There’s not much in the way of character (no grandparents, for example), Junor Souza’s Drosselmeyer being the sole exception. I do miss the hint of darkness some productions give him, though. Elsewhere, it’s good to see the children given some proper ballet choreography for once.

Once Clara has snuck back downstairs, the projections of rats on the wall are excellent, as is the way sparling effervescence magically tumbles down the staircase. The transition is a little disappointing though, especially when set against some of the other large company offerings around. The battle is a bit of a damp squib and I’m not entirely sure what the couple of suffragettes, some gingerbread men and two figures that look like they’re from a 1960s sci-fi series are doing in there (I know, it’s a dream, so anything goes). So, it comes as a surprise when things turn truly violent, the sweet Clara (now Ivana Bueno) grabbing a sword and running King Rat through, and then looking rather pleased with herself (as indeed she does when recounting the moment at the start of Act Two). I know it’s all make-believe but it does feel a little uncomfortable.

There’s another Dick Bird’s design triumph in the landscape for the pas de deux for Clara and the Nutcracker Prince, the elegant and handsome Paulo Rodrigues, especially that wonderful what looks like the gnarled remains of a tree in the background. The choreography doesn’t quite have the romantic oomph one expects though.

The choreography for the Ice Realm feels like a dancing opportunity missed too. There are some tricky steps and a lot of pirouettes for the Isolde, the Ice Queen (Anna Nevzorova), but where are all the wonderful patterns one expects from the corps?

If Bird’s Act One designs are beautifully Edwardian, those for Act Two are straight out of a modern children’s picture book. Colour is everywhere. To say they are bright and vivid doesn’t even start to describe them.

In the divertissements, while the confectionary itself more or less retains the traditional links to location, the choreography itself has rather lost them, which feels unfortunate. That for Turrón (a Spanish nougat) is vaguely Spanish, and is at least dressed as such, but it’s difficult to see too much connection in the others. Particularly disappointing is Sahlab, a creamy, sweet Egyptian drink of hot orchid root milk with cinnamon, and as delicious as it sounds. It’s also wonderfully smooth, which makes it a shame that the dance has lost all its sense of silky, sultry even, adagio. And Tanghulu (Chinese candied hawthorn berries), a sort of reworked sweeps dance from Act One, is simply odd all round.

In many ways, the highlight is the usual Mother Ginger figure, reimagined here is a woman atop of box of Liquorice Allsorts, with the children returning as dancing sweets alongside Thiago Silva as a sort of Bertie Bassett. I usually hate this scene with a passion (thank you Sir Peter Wright for cutting it), but it works well in context here.

Flowers are replaced by Buttercream Roses, whose headpieces do them no favours (not for the first time in the evening). But the ensemble choreography is the best of the ballet and I’m all for Clara and the Nutcracker Prince joining in, although they do rather take the lead.

The pas de deux for the Sugar Plum Fairy and her Cavalier, Emma Hawes and Aitor Arrieta, flew past, the choreographic choices loaded with subtle artistry for her, as well as exciting leaps for him.

So, a few reservations, but English National Ballet’s Nutcracker is one that I’m sure will endure. It’s also a ballet that the non-ballet regular is likely to enjoy. Who knows, it might even bring them back for more.