Kodiak Puts on the Nutcracker

Lydia Stanford and Nic Gili rehearsing. Kayla Desroches/KMXT
Lydia Stanford and Nic Gili rehearsing. Kayla Desroches/KMXT

Kayla Desroches/KMXT

The first performance of the Nutcracker is tonight. The holiday special runs every three years, and the cast has been hard at work rehearsing.

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Lydia Stanford’s ballet slippers squeak on the auditorium stage. This afternoon, she’s practicing with the male lead dancer, who flew in from Idaho to play the role of the Nutcracker prince.

Stanford says the ballet studio in Kodiak doesn’t have many male ballet dancers.

“We have a couple that’ll come from the high school and have been dancing with us for a couple of years, but it’s just a different experience when you have a guy that comes up from a professional ballet and teaches you all these cool lifts, and at first you’re scared and you’re kind of like, oh my goodness, can you lift me over your head? And then all of a sudden you’re in the air, and it’s really cool.”

Stanford is one of two high school seniors playing both the snow queen and sugar plum fairy, and they’ll cycle through the roles for each performance.

She’s also the daughter of the Nutcracker’s director, Jenny Stanford, who’s a teacher at the Little School of Dance. A familial connection with dance is something she shares with the male lead, Nic Gili, who says his mother ran a ballet school in Idaho when he was a kid. The 25-year-old says that’s why he’s a dancer now.

Gili arrived on island last Friday – which means he’s only had a week to rehearse and learn the choreography.

“When I was a younger dancer, I would have considered this very quick to learn everything, but there’s always times you have to learn something fast or someone gets injured or something, you might have to go in.”

He says he has another job shortly after this one that will also require a quick turnaround.

Gili says over the time he’s been rehearsing the Nutcracker in Kodiak, he’s built more confidence in his part, which is a new one to him.

“I’m a prince, which is a really hard role for me. I’m more bravado and jumps versus calm, controlled prince.”

He says his favorite roles as a dancer with Ballet Idaho are the high energy ones.

“The other guys in the company are certainly more artistic. They’ll pay more attention to their lines, and I just want to jump as high as I can, turn as fast as I can, and do as many turns as I can.”

He says this role has given him the opportunity to try things he normally wouldn’t on stage.

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