Students in grades 2, 3, 4 and 5 went to see the Nutcracker Backstage at the Portland Merrill Auditorium on November 27th. The show demonstrates how the ballet's special effects function. In the ballet, there is a tree that is towering 40 feet above the mouse battle. This tree is the tallest ever on Merrill Auditorium's stage. They showed us how the 10 man crew is making the tree grow and shrink. Also they showed us how the snow falls on the dancers and how they clean up and re-use the tiny pieces of paper over and over again. Full-scale Nutcracker productions require a large number of dancers, many of them children; this year more than 200 Maine State Ballet dancers and students from Maine State School for the Performing Arts participated in one or more performances.
We had a great time!
