Christmas With the Rockettes

We were able to go to opening night of the Radio City Music Hall's Christmas Spectacular last week with one of our friends, Matt Murray. He is a theater critic and gets tickets for free so he can review their performances. He was very kind and invited us along. This year is the Rockettes 85th Anniversary so it was a little extra celebratory. We got to see Radio City in all of its Christmas-y glory for the third year in a row.

However, this is the first year that we got to go inside. Once we entered the lobby, the large chandelier caught our eye. It was gorgeous. I didn't get a great photo of it, but you get the gist. The individual crystals were shaped like snowflakes.

Our seats were awesome. We were four or five rows back from the stage on the right hand side of the theater. The ceiling was lit up with projected snowflakes, which was fun. While we were waiting, the small set of curtains to our right parted and out popped a Wurlitzer Organ. There was a similar one on the other side. The organists had no sheet music in front of them. They were playing a duet of Christmas carols. It was lovely.

The Rockettes were our favorite part of the show. They were really fun to watch, especially when they were all lined up and kicking in unison.

My favorite number was the one where they were all dressed up like tin soldiers. They marched around in sweeping lines and intricate formations. It was really awesome. Brian looked it up later and found out that during this one piece, each Rockette walks about 1 mile. They all stayed in perfect unison and it was really cool. At the end they line up single file and fall over slow-motion style. It was cute. The Rockettes have been performing this number each year for as long as they have been around.

The sets were all great and the music was awesome.

There was one part where Santa Claus is trying to teach a mother and daughter about the true meaning of Christmas. He's striving toward the fact that they should spend time together and whatnot, but it came off as they should buy presents (video games) that they can do together. This part I could have done without because it consisted of an animated backdrop in the form of a video game and some of the Rockettes were dancing in front of the screen as if they were the characters of the game that the mom and daughter were controlling. It was really hokey, and we were glad when that part passed.

The last thing they did was the Nativity Story. They read passages from the Book of Luke in the Bible while Silent Night was playing in the background. The scene where the angels are delivering the good news to the shepherds was beautiful. They had real sheep too.

After that though they dwelt totally upon the Wise Men and their gifts. I didn't think there was a way to make the Nativity story materialistic, but they sure did. It was all about the gifts and the rich Wise Men with their long processions of servants and robes and banners and trinkets, etc. Then when they arrived at the manger where Baby Jesus was, there was lots of twirling and flourishing of the gifts as they were handed around in preparation to be presented. It was sad and funny at the same time because it was so ridiculous. They did have real camels and a donkey in the processions, which was cool.

All in all in was a fun experience, and overall we enjoyed it. I don't know that it will become a yearly occurrence  but it was neat to go and see what it was all about and get to see the theater. Another item to cross off our bucket list!