Nutcracker: Backstage with English National Ballet

For dance fans around the world, it’s impossible to imagine Christmas without The Nutcracker. This festive production has been at the heart of English National Ballet’s repertoire since the company was established in 1950 and the ENB have been delighting audiences with fresh interpretations of Marius Petipa’s original choreography every year since then, staging ten different adaptations to date and bringing the classic story as well as Tchaikovsky’s iconic score to life. But the success and ongoing popularity of the The Nutcracker is not something that the English National Ballet takes for granted. Fashions and tastes will always change, whilst the market for live entertainment is broader than ever, which means that ballet must be more relevant and compete harder for both traditional and new audiences, to satisfy the purists and to excite and delight a younger crowd. Sky Arts commissioned Cornerstone Studios and Director, Zoe Dobson, to create this three-part series Nutcracker: Backstage with English National Ballet to showcase what it takes to re-invent a globally renowned classic. The first two, hour-long episodes follow the preparations and rehearsals which build to the opening night, while the final two-hour special, which aired on December 23rd and is available to stream on NOW, features a complete performance of the show filmed at London’s Coliseum. It takes a vast amount of effort to make something look so effortless, not just for the English National Ballet but for the Production and Post Production crews alike. To find out how everything remained en pointe throughout...read on.

Vickie Mansell – Post Producer

Discussions for Nutcracker began in June 2024 with filming beginning in September. Our brief was to oversee full Post Production for a two-part, behind-the-scenes series culminating in a live performance of the ballet recorded during the opening week at the London Coliseum, ready for TX on Sky Arts in the run up to Christmas. Following the offline, turnaround was set to be one week from picture lock to delivery. The Performance Episode was just three days! .     

From the very start, the team at Cornerstone Studios wanted to work with Sky Post and had requested both Jon Slade and Melissa Holton to be across the Offline. The Commissioning Editor, Benedetta Pinelli, who was also series producer, had previously worked with them on other Arts docs and really wanted them both in addition to the wider Sky Post team. This was particularly important as I was given hard delivery deadlines to meet so having the whole process under one roof was a real plus. I was super confident with our team and their creative and technical skills – the biggest challenge was to manage production expectations and to ensure we met the hard deadlines.

We managed full Post Production throughout, beginning with initial schedule and workflow conversations as well as engaging with the key crew and advising best practice wherever necessary. That relationship was pivotal to the success of the project especially when, after a couple of shoots, the DOP began filming in 4K to allow more scope to punch in during the edit. Initially, the behind-the-scenes docs were due to TX in HD, but as they were now being shot in a higher resolution, which was incorporated into our Post workflow early on, Sky were able to benefit from this and we were able to ultimately deliver and TX in UHD. It sounds like a simple change, but it was made possible after many conversations regarding budgetary queries during which Liam Stiles (Technical Workflow Supervisor) and I were able to reassure the Production team that for Sky Post it was an easy update because we would be able to absorb the additional ingest and storage costs inherent with 4K. For Sky Post it was more about the time it would take to turnaround and ingest the rushes ready for edit. This was a pretty meaty process as we were getting a minimum of two shoots per week between September and December. The Edit Operations team got into a great rhythm with the turnover of rushes which allowed the edit to remain on track. It was only during the latter weeks in Offline that we hit a crunch period which coincided with a lot more dance rehearsal content being filmed later in the schedule as the performance deadline loomed large. Throughout, Cornerstone Studios took advantage of Sky’s Workflow and Tech Support – it’s one of Sky Post’s USPs and what we thrive on, so Liam and I were often called upon to advise regarding camera changes and additional workflow queries. Whilst we knew there would always be challenges, there were no surprises along the way.

We were constantly aware of the tight delivery deadline following picture lock, so engaging a stellar team in all areas of Post was key. For me it was an absolute dream team both technically and creatively as they all brought something special to the project. In Jon Slade and Melissa Holton, we had undeniable editing wizardry; Mark Mulcaster and Warren Williams worked their colour magic with a specific brief on tone and colour on Episodes 1 and 2 respectively; Finn Curry brought his innate musicality which always shines through and for the docs was a huge bonus, and it goes without saying that he always manages to get the audio tone just perfect! Tom Nursey was across the performance technical mix and was also integral to the audio workflow from the get-go, being across initial discussions with the Crew and OB team whilst also providing a great source of support and fielding my endless questions. And just having Chris Hay in the online meant I knew we were in super safe hands…technically he’ll tell you he did very little, but he always hits the sweet spot and keeps the ship afloat right through to delivery, even when deadlines are imminent and with many technical fixes to address. Chris just manages to make it all look effortless and this was especially so for the performance episode. Over on the Post Project Management side, having Lizzy Brown supporting me as the Co-Ord across the project was a blessing. Throughout it all she was super-efficient and always one step ahead of the game, especially so with all the rushes management and ingest. The success is all on screen! I know for certain all the teams at Cornerstone, English National Ballet and Sky were delighted with the behind-the-scenes docs and the performance films. It’s certainly a series to be proud of.

The team on Nutcracker was my ‘Fantasy Football Post Prod’ Dream Team…don’t ever let them travel together! And now I’ll leave them to talk you through how they did it.

Melissa Holton – Offline Editor Episode 1

I was so excited to be part of the team on Nutcracker. The English National Ballet were creating a brand-new adaptation after fourteen years of running the previous version and it was to have an up-to-date story with modern themes, choreography, costumes and scenery. The two episodes we were cutting were designed to show what it takes to create a brand-new interpretation from scratch. Nutcracker had no script, or at least only a basic one which was constantly evolving, with the interviews and rehearsals being shot as work on the cut continued. With Edit Producer, Harriet Evans-Lombe, our job was to tease out the story from all the footage, and it wasn’t until Week 4 of the edit that we had a rough idea of what was going into the programme! The aim was to avoid using voiceover to tell the story so we needed to find the bits of the interviews and actuality which would join everything together.

The documentary joins the ENB three months before opening night when big creative decisions have to be made. Episode 1 focuses on three main characters: Artistic Director and Choreographer, Aaron S. Watkin, Olivier Award Winning Co-Choreographer, Arielle Smith and Set and Costume Designer, Dick Bird. We wanted to explore how Aaron and Arielle set about creating and rehearsing new choreography, drawing from their different backgrounds and perspectives, weaving together the worlds of ballet and musical theatre. We also wanted to discover how Dick had designed not just the complicated sets but also the many hundreds of elaborate costumes.

Having seen the first few rough cuts, Sky Commissioner Benedetta Pinelli suggested that we get to the first rehearsal as quickly as we could which meant that a lot of the setting up of the story and characters was reduced right down. Her feeling was that this was what the Sky Arts audience would be most interested in because it’s quite unusual to see what happens in a ballet rehearsal, and it would be a rare opportunity for the viewer to be able to immerse themselves within the run-throughs of a particular scene for, say, 7 or 8 minutes at a time. With that in mind we then brought in the interviews to add an extra dimension and to bring the rehearsal footage together.

Working on an Ob Doc is fun at times and challenging at others. You never really know what you’re going to get when the rushes come in so it’s an interesting process to see what’s happened and what people have said in rehearsals or interviews. Nutcracker was filmed over 20 or so days so I was working closely with Harriet day-to-day to build sequences, as well as with Zoe during breaks in filming. I kept in regular contact with Vickie Mansell, our Post Producer, keeping her up to date on how things were going to make sure we were on schedule and I also drew on the expertise of Finn Curry, the Re-Recording Mixer, occasionally sending him little bits of audio which sounded as if they might be trickier to mix. For example, there was a section where Aaron Watkins, the Choreographer, was talking over some archive ballet clips which he was watching on a laptop. You could still hear the audio from the clips as Aaron was speaking so I wanted to make sure that Finn could remove the background music before I knew I could edit down what Aaron was saying. Finn confirmed that he could, and we were able to progress quickly. 

I think that having watched the behind-the-scenes episodes, the audience would feel even more excited about seeing the live show in Episode 3 or even on stage at the London Coliseum itself.  You get to see how a world class ballet company puts together a completely new production from start to finish from scratch, from the scenery and costume design to the new choreography, storylines and characters. You get a unique view into a secret world which ordinarily you’d not be allowed to see and knowing know how much work had gone into making the show with all the trials and tribulations, you’d feel you have to see the end result! 

Jon Slade – Offline Editor Episode 2

Working on Nutcracker was something of a gear change for me in a year where, apart from working on a forthcoming episode of Landscape Artist of the Year, I'd pretty much exclusively been working flat out in Online and Finishing with Sky Post, but I was delighted to be working once again with director Zoe Dobson having worked with her previously.

I landed on a project which had already been in Offline for a couple of weeks or so. Melissa Holton, who I'd last worked with on another two-part documentary Dickens in Italy, had started on Episode 1 and I would be cutting Episode 2. Generally speaking, although the edits were sharing the same Media Composer project, they existed independently of each other.

The aim of the two programmes was to take a rare peek behind the scenes at the workings of the English National Ballet as they choreographed their new version of the Nutcracker ballet, the performance of which would feature as the third instalment in the series. For viewers hoping to see perilous disasters, dancers breaking bones, throwing temper tantrums and scenery collapsing... I'm afraid you’ve come the wrong place. The English National Ballet are a highly experienced outfit and know how to deliver a great show, which means as a documentary maker you can afford to take the time to settle down in an actuality scene, watch things evolve and be true to how events play out.

With that in mind we had some big editorial decisions to make. Do we have to explain the story of The Nutcracker? Should we make the documentary gritty or magical?  When should we be interview-led and when should we be in actuality? These are the kind of decisions that needed to be made whilst also adhering to the requirements of the channel. In the end what we created became a good balance of all of those things.

To achieve the integration of different scenes ranging from costume fittings, set construction, musical direction and choreography with the dancers, we blended some scene changes and created vignettes within scenes, whilst also respecting the broadly linear narrative. Some sections were removed, revised and refined a few times, whilst others remained unchanged right to the end.

Finn Curry – Re-Recording Mixer

I was very pleased to be involved in Nutcracker. Having a background in classical music, and an enduring love for the music of Tchaikovsky, I felt I could bring plenty of knowledge and passion to the project and that this could hopefully help in certain sections of the Mix. This programme was being made now as it covers the rehearsals and prep for the English National Ballet's reworking of The Nutcracker. It's a production that they put on every Christmas - it is after all about Christmas in many ways - but this was a brand-new version with new set design and choreography which made it ripe for a behind-the-scenes programme.

The main brief on a show like this is to try and make it sound good. That sounds trite, but when the filming has been done in an environment where people are moving around, dancing, talking across each other and generally doing what they want, there is often a lot of cleaning up to do to and one has to try and search for the main elements of a scene and disregard those which could confuse the Mix. Often in the rehearsals and meetings there would be a Boom plus three or four Radio Mics running simultaneously to capture everything, so it was a case of going through all the material and making sure I used what needed to be heard, whilst also getting rid of anything that got in the way. Ultimately, the aim of an audio mix is to allow the story or content to shine and not to get in the way. That, as always, is the intention. 

The rehearsal rooms were a nice element of this show and required a quick think about a method for approaching them before I started. There was always a Boom and all the main contributors had Radio Mics. This meant that the Boom was ever present in the mix - with minimal processing - and then I could cut in the Radio Mics from whichever contributor I needed to so as to keep the focus on the most relevant dialogue. The Boom became more like the room reverb sound rather than a direct record, as it wasn't often that close to anyone. But this was ideal as it meant the sense of space was kept throughout and made for a realistic and lively sounding mix rather than one which could've been quite dry and dead if it was only radio mics.

A small challenge that came from having the Boom in the rehearsal space was making the moments when I couldn't use it sound convincing. Occasionally, it was evident that there were people talking out of shot, or the pianist was practicing and none of those sounds were needed or wanted. In this case I carefully matched a Reverb (using a preset in Altiverb) which I could then use on the Radio Mics to give them the same 'roomy' feel that the Boom gave. In this way a consistency of sound was maintained as I could feed in the Altiverb whenever the Boom wasn't being used, hopefully creating a seamless feel to the sound in the rehearsal spaces. You could say that the main 'sound' for this show was the lively, yet focused sound of the 'Actuality' mainly being the rehearsal rooms and other spaces where the prep for the ballet was happening.

The other main content of the show was talking heads. These were tracklaid on their own small group of tracks and made up of Boom, Radio Mic, or both - whichever I felt sounded best and cut through nicely. I wanted the talking heads to have a slightly 'drier' sound in order to sound distinct from the rehearsal/actuality content. This would help the viewer identify which area of the mix they were listening to if a talking head was then talking over footage of rehearsal/actuality content.

Another area of the mix that required some care and attention was the blending of rehearsal piano and orchestral recordings. I had to do some judicious editing and occasional timestretching to make these sequences work. But it was fun and it had to work or else it could end up sounding clumsy and a bit forced. I was conscious that people watching the show may well be fans of Tchaikovsky so I wanted to be very careful to make the transitions work!

The deadlines were tight. I was starting work on a Tuesday and the program was airing on the following Monday. I didn’t let the deadline have any effect on the way I worked and stuck to my processes - I did a dialogue and production FX edit on day one, then on the second day I edited the music, laid in SFX and did a quick mix pass of the music round the dialogue. Day 3 was dedicated to finer mixing as well as iZotope work and EQing. Day 4 was then a quick run-through before a 12pm sign off and delivery, delivering the show in 5.1 and Stereo, which is standard practice in Audio Post at Sky for any Longform show. I delivered my mix on a Friday evening and prayed that there were no QC Fails (never in doubt).

The overall process of mixing Nutcracker was hard work, but interesting and ultimately satisfying. As ever with a show like this, one of the main challenges is to try and make the sound mix 'disappear', meaning that really the viewer is able to enjoy the show and the story without being distracted by any issues that might have arisen in the recording process. It is so often the case that 99% of the work is therefore invisible but if I've done my job well the mix should provide a platform for the content to shine. I'm very pleased with the results of the Nutcracker Mix. In Audio at Sky Post we have worked hard on providing a technical platform for working on shows such as this, and the knowledge and working practices we have built up mean that I can confidently approach a Mix of this kind knowing that I can make it work well in the time provided.

Mark Mulcaster – Colourist

I had worked with Director Zoe Dobson on Guitar Riffs last year and so it was nice to have her back in the suite to collaborate once again. Colour took place over two days with the second day including sign-off. With the final Online starting the following day, and transmission being only a couple of days after, this could be considered a reasonably quick turnaround. With Nutcracker, Zoe had a specific look that she wanted to achieve from the grade which needed to feel both authentic and natural and yet with its own modern style. She also wanted to ensure that the depiction of skin tones remained true to the wide variety of individuals within the company. ENB is made up of a true array of nationalities and we wanted to ensure that the grade was an honest reflection of that.

Zoe also wanted to bring out and emphasise the modern architecture of the ENB’s new purpose-built 'dance factory' which utilises a limited palette of materials with raw materials left exposed giving the building a kind of twenty-first century, brutalist aesthetic. With the dance studios being lit by tungsten lighting and featuring large windows flooding the rooms with daylight, this created a bit of a challenge to balance out the two without going overly blue. Through the look-creation, Zoe expressed a preference for cooler whites which gave the rehearsal spaces a cool, modern twist which was offset by the warmth in the wood panelling. 

The interviews with the choreographers needed to feel separate from the main actuality. Those interviews were shot over a period of time and on similar yet differing backdrops. Some of the interviews had pickups which weren’t always consistent with their main interviews so it took a bit of time to try and get them to match more closely and this also included trying to match the texture of the lenses with some angles being softer than others. This was mainly achieved by using a combination of isolation shapes, sky selection keys and Baselight’s texture equaliser which allows for specific pixel frequencies to be sharpened or softened.

I think the final finished film works well as a companion piece to the live performance of Nutcracker. The Edit was really well balanced being accessible to both the casual viewer as well as to those who are fans of the art form.

Chris Hay - Online Editor

It was great to be working with Zoe again, she makes amazing films. The online on this was very straightforward with the hard yards having already been done in the Offline. This was a UHD/SDR delivery with a 2.39:1 letterbox which meant that there was quite a bit of repositioning of pictures to be done. There were also a couple of synch drifts from the conform which Finn had already flagged, but because of the quality of the footage and the way that everything had been handled by our Edit Operations Department, Onlining Episodes 1 and 2 was a breeze.

Episode 3, the ballet performance, was shot on HD with the audio being mixed out of house by the live Director's usual Mixer. It was delivered back to Tom Nursey in our Audio Department who made sure that it was Sky compliant. It was a real pleasure meeting and working with Peter Jones, the OB Director, who regaled me with fascinating information about directing live ballet and opera - a true master of his craft.

This was such a great series to work on and the commitment and hard work that the dancers and choreographers put into their performances piqued my interest to such a degree that I ended up going to The Coliseum to see my first ballet! I have to say that working on the behind-the-scenes episodes as well as the performance really gave me an appreciation of how much work goes into making a world class ballet.