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SYNOPSIS
Act I
The Silberhaus Family is giving a Christmas Party. Clara and Fritz, their children, greet the guests. The parents give toys to all the children. Suddenly, a mysterious person arrives. It turns out to be Clara’s Uncle Drosselmeyer, the toymaker. He entertains the children with his magical tricks and show everyone his amazing life-size mechanical wind-up dolls. Drosselmeyer brings a special gift for Clara – a wooden nutcracker. While she is dancing with it, her brother Fritz, teasing her, tries to grab it from her, as they fight over it, they accidentally drop it and break it. Drosselmeyer quickly repairs it.
The party ends, the guests leave, and the Stahlbaums retire for the night. Clara awakens and creeps back into the living room to see her Nutcracker. The clock strikes midnight. Suddenly, the room fills with giant mice who attack Clara. Her Uncle Drosselmeyer appears and scares the mice away. But, it seems that Drosselmeyer is no ordinary toy maker, he is a magician and he begins to cast spells on the room, making the Christmas Tree grow larger, making giant toy soldiers appear and transforming her Nutcracker into a prince. Drosselmeyer disappears and the mice return. The soldiers, led by the valiant Nutcracker, come to Clara’s rescue. The Mouse King attacks the Nutcracker, and the Nutcracker seems to be losing, but Clara hits the Mouse King with her shoe, distracting him so that the Nutcracker wins the battle.
The walls melt away, and suddenly Clara and the Nutcracker prince find themselves outside in the snow. The Snow Queen greets them, and when she finds out how Clara saved the prince, she calls for a sleigh to honor them by taking them to the Kingdom of the Sweets. Her magical Snowflake fairies swirl around and dance, bringing snow and Clara and the Nutcracker Prince depart for the Kingdom of Sweets in an enchanted sleigh led by reindeer.
ACT II
Angels light the hall of the Sugar Plum Fairy at the Palace in the Kingdom of the Sweets. The Sugar Plum Fairy has had word of the arrival of guests and calls on the inhabitants of her kingdom to come to the palace and greet the guests. Clara and the Nutcracker Prince arrive in their sleigh. The Sugar Plum Fairy asks them to tell their story. When she hears of their valour, the Sugar Plum Fairy honors Clara by crowning her and seating her on a throne with her Nutcracker. She calls upon her subjects to dance and entertain them. The dances include “chocolate”, a Spanish Dance; “coffee”, an Arabian Dance; and “tea”, a Chinese Dance. Clara is also entertained by “Marzipan”-the dance of the Reed Pipes, Mother Ginger and her children, a Trepak dance, and the Waltz of the Flowers. Then, the Sugar Plum Fairy and her Cavalier dance a grand pas de deux. As the celebration draws to a close, the sleigh arrives to take Clara and the Prince home. Clara awakens under the Christmas tree with her wooden Nutcracker wondering whether it was all just a dream?
GUEST ARTISTS:
 | PAM GLAUBER: Sugar Plum Fairy/Snow Queen/ Mrs. Silberhaus Pam Kelly Glauber began her dance career at age six at the School of the Hartford Ballet. She later attended Connecticut Dance School and Connecticut Ballet Center before joining Connecticut Ballet as a company dancer. She has also trained at BalletMet Columbus and Columbus Dance Theater, as well as summer dance programs with Boston Ballet and the Walnut Hill School. As a professional dancer, Pam has performed with Connecticut Ballet; Ballet Theater Company; Fisher Ballet Productions; Ajkun Ballet Theatre; Staten Island Ballet; Alvin Ailey’s Extension Program; and Xclaim Dance Company in Columbus, Ohio. She is currently a company dancer with Dimensional Dance in West Hartford, CT, and teaches ballet, pointe, and variations at FarmingtonDance in Simsbury. She is also a prize-winning Irish dancer and has competed in the World Irish Dancing Championships. Pam holds a BA from Cornell University and a certificate in editing from NYU, and she has enjoyed a parallel career in publishing. When she is not dancing, she freelances as a children’s book editor while raising two young children. |
 | ASHLEY ZHANG: Sugar Plum Fairy/ Snow Queen/Dew Drop Fairy Ashley Zhang is from Shenzhen, China. Currently, her training includes Jose Mateo Ballet Theater, Margot Parsons, Orlando Ballet, American Ballet Theater and Burklyn Ballet. Currently she performs with Margot Parsons Dance Visions. Performance credits include “Flight”, “Summer Heat”, “Overlay”, “Gateway”, “Borders”, “Here and There”, and “After the Ball” with Margot Parsons; Across the Ages Dance Project for 3 years; and several other pieces with Molly Wheat including “Death and the Maiden”, and “Caryatides”. |
 | BRIAN SYMS: Cavalier/Snow King/Mr. Silberhaus Brian Syms, 21, started dancing at age 14 at the Artist Collective in Hartford CT, taking classes in African dance. He trained at the Greater Hartford Academy for Performing Arts and briefly at the Hartt School as a dance major. He has worked with The Spectrum In Motion Dance Co. and is currently in the Apprentice Training Program with The Sonia Plumb Dance Company . |
 | KSENYA HENTISZ: Trepak Dance Soloist Ksenya is a Ukrainian Folk Dancer and member of the Syzokryli Dance Ensemble, Obriy, and other folk groups. She studies ballet with New York’s Steps on Broadway. While in high school Miss Hentisz was a member of the New Jersey Ballet’s Junior Company and participated in performances at New Jersey Performing Arts and the Papermill Playhouse, among other venues. Ksenya is a Fisher Ballet tradition and has performed in every Fisher Ballet Production Nutcracker since our inception. |
 | MOTHER GINGER: Allison McDermott Allison is a circus artist born, raised and trained in Middletown, Connecticut. She is a graduate of the New England Center for Circus Arts professional track program and is now performing, directing and teaching circus throughout New England and beyond. Most recently, she performed and choreographed the aerial work in ARTFARM’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream in Middletown, CT. |