New Adventures has announced full casting and touring dates for 30th Anniversary, newly designed and reimagined production of Matthew Bourne’s Nutcracker! The tour opens at Theatre Royal Plymouth on Monday 15 November 2021 ahead of a Christmas Season at Sadler’s Wells, London from Tuesday 7 December 2021 to Sunday 30 January 2022. The tour then continues until April 2022, visiting a total of 14 venues across the UK. Full listings below.
Matthew Bourne’s Nutcracker! features a cast of well-loved New Adventures stars along with many stars of the future! Cordelia Braithwaite and Katrina Lyndon will play Clara with Ashley Shaw and Monique Jonas as Princess Sugar. Harrison Dowzell will play the title role, along with Ben Brown and Reece Causton and Fritz will be played by Dominic North, James Lovell and Stephen Murray. Playing the formidable Dr Dross we have Neil Westmoreland, Reece Causton and Danny Reubens with his wife, Mrs Dross performed by Madelaine Brennan, Daisy May Kemp and Steph Billers.
The citizens of Sweetieland are performed by New Adventures’ dancers Jonathon Luke Baker, Benjamin Barlow Bazeley, Alistair Beattie, Isaac Peter Bowry, Kayla Collymore, Keenan Fletcher, Cameron Flynn, Rose Goddard, Shoko Ito, Harry Ondrak-Wright, Catrin Thomas and Bryony Wood. Making their debuts with New Adventures are Jade Copas, Jessica Crompton, Gabrielle de Souza, Kurumi Kamayachi and Rory Macleod. New Adventures are thrilled to announce and welcome their first Emerging Artist Apprentice, Enrique Ngbokota who joins the company having been supported and mentored by New Adventures throughout their third year of training. This apprenticeship is supported by The Archie Lloyd Chartiable Foundation.
New Adventures also announced today an exciting partnership with Fortnum & Mason and Matthew Bourne’s Nutcracker!
The magic of Nutcracker! will be brought to life in the Fortnum & Mason Piccadilly flagship store this festive season, including a themed Christmas window conjured up by Nutcracker! designer Anthony Ward. Later this year, Fortnum & Mason will unveil their Christmas campaign, which includes characters from the production exploring the store at night, alongside sweet new creations in The Parlour and the Diamond Jubilee Tea Salon. Throughout the Christmas season £1 of each Knickerbocker Glory purchased at Fortnum & Mason will be donated to further New Adventures’ engagement work with young people and communities.
The sweetest of all Matthew Bourne’s treats returns for the first time ten years; it’s a Nutcracker! for all seasons. With family-sized helpings of Bourne’s trademark wit, pathos and magical fantasy, Nutcracker! follows Clara’s bittersweet journey from a darkly comic Christmas Eve at Dr. Dross’ Orphanage, through a shimmering, ice-skating winter wonderland to the scrumptious candy kingdom of Sweetieland, influenced by the lavish Hollywood musicals of the 1930s.
Tchaikovsky’s glorious score and Anthony Ward’s newly-refreshed delectable sets and costumes combine with Bourne’s dazzling choreography to create a fresh and charmingly irreverent interpretation of the classic. Expect a sprinkling of delicious new surprises in this reinvented production for 2021.
Recipient of the 2019 Special Olivier Award, Sir Matthew Bourne and New Adventures have produced some of the most successful dance productions of the last three decades. A truly national, dance-theatre touring company and one of Britain’s leading exporters of dance internationally, their productions include Swan Lake, Cinderella, The Red Shoes, Edward Scissorhands the acclaimed re-imagining of Romeo and Juliet and the recent world premiere of The Midnight Bell.
New Adventures is a national portfolio organisation supported using public funds by Arts Council England.
