Even Tchaikovsky’s “Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy”, the most enchanting of all of his Nutcracker pieces, is outplayed by giggles. This Nutcracker audience is replete with little girls, most of them in ribbons and red velvet, all of them unable to keep it together throughout the National Ballet of Canada’s annual showing of the Christmas classic.

When most holiday stalwarts have been lost to the ages or disinterest, or stripped of their traditionalism for mass and non-religious appeal, the Nutcracker ballet remains (along with, perhaps, Handel’s Messiah) a compelling Christmas tradition of high art for everyone. Midway through the production, a curtain parts to reveal a huge, heaving wall of tree swathed in gigantic ornaments, a veritable confrontation of Christmas, where magic and whimsy and toys-come-to-life are as essential as the ballet itself, anchored by seasoned principles but rounded out by a fleet of children, as lambs (many fluffy white lambs, and one black: adorable), fuzzy mice, delicate unicorns, and comic-relief chefs.  

It seems likely that this ballet, here employing the vibrant, vivacious choreography of Newmarket-born James Kudelka, could be the most populist part of a company’s yearly program. Still, nothing is lost in this exuberant, busy production, which fuses classic, haute elements (the Sugar Plum Fairy floats out of a golden Faberge egg) with a palette that’s more Narnian than New England, a cartoony electric Kool-Aid acid test of rusty orange gowns, slate jade jackets and low-cut purple leotards. roller-blading bears and a dancing horse do more to highlight the athleticism and energy of the dancing than undermine its seriousness. The Snow Queen and the Sugar Plum Fairy, in particular, conquer demanding solos with the kind of grace and glimmer that inspires and silences even the littlest attendees. Though it ends somewhat abruptly, Kudelka’s imagining of the Nutcracker is mostly fluid, always florid, and altogether fantastic.