kaberett | In a general spirit of trying to update at least briefly about Things That I Done (Reply)

This afternoon: matinee performance of The Nutcracker, English National Ballet, with A. It was the last (or very nearly the last?) performance and it seemed fairly obvious the performers were tired: while the dancers were naturally managing an impressive amount of "this incredible feat of physical exertion? pfff it's effortless", they were also less precise than I'd have expected on timings (so the overall choreography was a bit less coherent than it might have been), and I spotted at least one pretty bad ankle wobble. Costumes beautiful, sets beautiful, brass slightly out of tune on occasion as is the way of brass. The story was if anything slightly more incoherent than usual -- Drosselmeyer was compering the entire Kingdom of Sweets sequence??? Clara and the Nutcracker were not terribly distinct from the Sugar Plum Fairy and her consort??? the Nutcracker kept inexplicably having a mask removed and replaced??? -- but there was a BALLOON and I am v pleased to have seen such a large and professional performance.