There was a time when Christmas in Sydney without a production of The Nutcracker was unimaginable. The ballet attracts a festive audience, there is no doubt about it. So it is hardly a surprise that the Australian Ballet’s staging of Peter Wright’s Nutcracker as its final offering for the 2010 Sydney season was a total [...]

This last triple bill of the Australian Ballet’s 2010 season was an opportunity to revisit two ballets created by resident choreographer Stephen Baynes and to ponder on the emergence of a new force in Australian choreography, Tim Harbour.
Edge of Night, which gave the program its name, was first seen in 1997. What especially stood out [...]

Nutcracker: The Australian Ballet, Sydney and Melbourne, 2009
The 2009 season of Graeme Murphy’s Nutcracker: the story of Clara has all but convinced me that this work is the closest thing we have in Australia to a dance masterpiece. It is, like all great works of art, a very giving work. It continues to reveal new [...]