ES
Elizabeth Simoens
  • Dance
  • Class of 2014
  • San Pedro, CA

Elizabeth Simoens of San Pedro to Dance in Butler Ballet's 'The Nutcracker'

2013 Nov 25

Elizabeth Simoens of San Pedro is dancing in Butler Ballet's 31st annual production of The Nutcracker, Dec. 5-8 in Clowes Memorial Hall of Butler University.

Show times are 7:30 p.m. Dec. 5; 8 p.m. Dec. 6; 2 p.m. and 8 p.m. Dec. 7; and 2 p.m. Dec. 8. Tickets are $21.50-$28.50 for adults; $17-$23 for children, students and seniors; $14-$20 for groups of 15 or more. Tickets are available at the Clowes Hall box office or through Ticketmaster. For telephone orders, call (800) 982-2787.

Butler Ballet's performance of Tchaikovsky's classic ballet will feature 112 Butler dancers, plus 33 young dancers from the Indianapolis community. This year's Nutcracker will be accompanied by the Butler Symphony Orchestra under the director of Richard Auldon Clark.

"It's a great Nutcracker," said Larry Attaway, chair of Butler's Dance Department. "The students look wonderful, and we're very excited about it."

Many of the main roles have been double-cast to give Butler Ballet's 34 seniors a chance to showcase their talents.

Katherine Currier (Norwich, Vt.), and Shelby Shenkman (Boca Raton, Fla.), share the role of the Sugar Plum Fairy. Christian Griggs-Drane (Richmond, Va.) and Stuart Coleman (Lynchburg, Va.) will bring the Nutcracker to life.

Margaret Carey (Dayton, Ohio) and Alexandra Benson (Jacksonville, Fla.) will dance the role of Snow Queen. Samuel Rogers (Fort Wayne, Ind.) and George Vargas (Grasonville, Md.) will be Snow King.

The Dew Drop Fairy will be danced by Carly Hambridge (Matthews, N.C.) and Ashleigh Chuang (Collinsville, Conn.), and Conner Horak (a junior from Fort Collins, Col.) and Zachary Kukla (LaPorte, Ind.) will play the Cavalier.

In a change from the past few years, the roles of Clara and Fritz will be danced by children from the Indianapolis community rather than a Butler Ballet dancer. Michaela Sanger, a freshman at Herron High School in Indianapolis, will play Clara, and Peyton Barnes, a fourth-grader at Southwest Elementary School in Greenwood, will be Fritz.

And James Cramer '81, community relations manager at Clowes Hall, will reprise the role of Drosselmeyer.

As always, all Butler Dance faculty--Cynthia Pratt, Marek Cholewa, Stephan Laurent, Susan McGuire, Patrick Hinson, and Associate Dean of the Jordan College of the Arts Michelle Jarvis--have a hand in the choreography.

"It's going to be a wonderful, traditional Nutcracker, and yet have a real different look than people are used to with us" because faculty members handle different choreography assignments each year, Attaway said.