Kingston ballerina lands plum role of Clara
December 7, 2007
By MEGAN MCKEE
The Patriot Ledger
Don’t be surprised if a visit to this year’s ‘‘The Nutcracker’’ has you seeing familiar visions of dancing sugar plum fairies: More than 60 dancers hail from the South Shore, including one of the ballerinas who plays Clara.
Lauren Herfindahl, 12, won the lead role and danced on opening night. She rotates performances with three other ballerinas and by the end of December, she will have danced 12 times.
‘‘I was really excited and happy,’’ Lauren said of landing the coveted part. ‘‘It had been something I’d been hoping for for a long time. When I was little I’d put on ‘The Nutcracker’ music and dance around and pretend to be the sugar plum fairies or Clara.’’
Lauren has been dancing since she was 3. She transferred into the Boston Ballet School, from which 200 of the ballet’s performers are gleaned, when she and her family moved to Kingston from the West Coast three years ago.
‘‘You could tell the potential right away,’’ said Christine Busch, Lauren’s teacher at the school’s Norwell branch. Busch has been teaching ballet for 30 years and was a professional dancer with both New York’s American Ballet Theatre and the San Francisco Ballet.
Busch said that although students perform the same routines, the ones who excel are students like Lauren who can channel inner expression into dance.
‘‘The exercises are set but the artistry comes through the quality of movements. She is very artistic in her approach,’’ she said.
Lauren spent two years at the school’s Norwell branch before transferring to the flagship Boston school on Clarendon Street a year ago.
Lauren, who plans on dancing professionally as a career, makes the 70-mile round trip from her house to the studio six days a week. The practice itself lasts one-and-a-half to three hours, never mind the drive time. Rehearsals for ‘‘The Nutcracker’’ have been seven days a week since late October, and those leading up to opening night were six hours a day.
Add to that the need for school, family life and any other extracurricular activities, and it’s easy to see why this intense schedule isn’t for everyone. But Busch said that Lauren is a perfect candidate for the demands of a ballet career.
‘‘She has the determination to pursue it as well as the talent,’’ she said. ‘‘It takes that deep desire - it’s a very intense career and not everyone is suited for it.’’
It’s Lauren’s third year in the ‘‘The Nutcracker’’ and she said she is both nervous and excited about her first performance as Clara. She remains philosophical about it, explaining her inspiration in the artistic way that comes natural to her.
‘‘It’s kind of like you’re speaking a different language through body movements,’’ she said.
She’s also performed in four other Boston Ballet productions including ‘‘La Sylphide’’ and ‘‘Sleeping Beauty.’’
South Shore children in ‘The Nutcracker’
‘‘The Nutcracker’’ is a local holiday tradition, and for many young dancers, a dream come true. Here is a list of South Shore children dancing in the show. The curtain is up until Dec. 29.
BRAINTREE - Kelly McDonald, Margaret Jiang, Olivia McDonald.
BRIDGEWATER - Siena Dacey.
CANTON - Kaitlin McCarthy, Laura Borodic.
COHASSET - Sarah Gruber, Brianne Crough, Sofia Deligiannidis, Faith Porter.
DUXBURY - Caroline Manning, Tessa Endresen, Charlotte Hovey.
HANOVER - Alexa DeBuccia. HINGHAM - Emma Reilly, Erin Murray, Rebecca Mullaley, Hannah Pedone, Amelia Pedone, Emma Burleigh, Grace Barrett, Courtney Lane, Emily Carrick, Brooke Joyce, Caroline Kelleher, Julia Mitchell, Olivia Hartzell. HULL - Cassandra Tedeschi.
KINGSTON - Jocelyn Kelley, Alicia Ingersoll, Lauren Herfindahl.
MARSHFIELD - Sarah Newcomb, Rachel Navarrette, Isabella Rogovin.
MILTON - Audrey Hughes, Elizabeth Hiss, Julia Mastandrea, Hannah Green.
NORWELL - Abigail Howland, Alexis Henriquez, Margaret McCarthy, Elisa Rastelli, Neve Thompson.
PEMBROKE - Olivia Bolger.
PLYMOUTH - Rachel Smith, Blaney Shane, Harper Edwards, Isabel Mallon.
QUINCY - Ann Greenwood Taylor, Jessica Bowe, Christina Stuver, Samantha To, Chisato Kashiwa, Bridget Durgin. RANDOLPH - Tatiana Brittian.
ROCKLAND - Lyndsay Norris. SCITUATE - Maria D’Ambrosia, Hannah Nelson, Molly Trust, Genevieve Goodman STOUGHTON - Michaela Martini, Jessica Conroy
TAUNTON - Xavier Ferreira.
WALPOLE - Chelsea Perry.
WEST BRIDGEWATER - Mary Gee.
WEYMOUTH - Briana Ford.
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