Day 322: Sacramento Ballet's "Peter Pan"

Last night, Mr. E and I attended the world premiere of "Peter Pan" from the Sacramento Ballet (we're season subscribers for the Friday evening performances). The performance was preceded by George Balanchine's "Stars & Stripes." We've seen bit and pieces of that ballet before, as the Sac Ballet has numerous Balanchine pieces in its repertoire, so it was lovely to see the full five-part creation.

I felt that "Peter Pan" was too long and that the focus was too much on spectacle sometimes (e.g. elaborate sets) rather than on the dancing and the story, which was also a challenge for me with Ron Cunningham's original "The Great Gatsby" a couple of years ago. The ballet ran about 1 hour 20 minutes with no intermission, and it could easily have been cut by 10-15 minutes without losing anything critical.

Here are some still publicity images, featuring Rex Wheeler as Peter Pan, Christopher Nachtrab as Captain Hook, and Maggie Rupp as Tinkerbell: