The Nutcracker

MM Contemporary Dance Company – The Nutcracker | Dance
Sunday 18 January 2026 - 17:30

Mauro Bigonzetti, one of the leading Italian choreographers and former director of Aterballetto and of the Ballet Company of Teatro alla Scala, reinterprets the timeless fairy tale of The Nutcracker set to the famous score by Pëtr Il’ič Tchaikovsky, presenting a dance production in which the choreographic narrative retraces the stories of Drosselmeier and Clara through the evocative power of movement and music. On stage, the multi-award-winning MM Contemporary Dance Company, an outstanding presence in the Italian dance scene directed by choreographer Michele Merola, performs within the visionary stage design created by Carlo Cerri, who blends reality and fantasy through the use of video projections. A captivating ballet that invites the audience to let themselves be carried into the world of their own imagination.

The story overflows with images that oscillate between reality and dream, explain Mauro Bigonzetti and Carlo Cerri. Fantastic, dreamlike atmospheres generated by the power of imagination evoke visions that move along the subtle line dividing what is real from what is imaginary. This is where we began in telling this Nutcracker: drawing not so much from the great ballet repertoire, but from Hoffmann’s original tale, steeped in those visionary atmospheres that play with the ambiguity between what is real and what is fantastic, between the visible and the unconscious.

Program and cast

MM Contemporary Dance Company – THE NUTCRACKER

Choreography: Mauro Bigonzetti
Music: Pëtr Il’ič Tchaikovsky
Performers, MM Contemporary Dance Company (22 dancers):
Matilde Abbati, Filippo Begnozzi, Elisa Bocconi, Giovanni Karol Borriello, Paolo Giovanni Grosso, Anna Dal Maso, Sara Ferrentino, Mario Genovese, Aurora Lattanzi, Fabiana Lonardo, Giulia Lusetti, Sara Manzini, Luca Marchi, Lorenzo Molinaro, Federico Musumeci, Andrea Palmieri, Giorgia Raffetto, Alice Ruspaggiari, Diletta Savini, Gabriele Scarcia, Nicola Stasi, Giuseppe Villarosa

Set, lighting, and video concept: Carlo Cerri
Video production: OOOPStudio
Costumes: Lois Swandale and Kristopher Millar
Assistant to the choreographer: Roberto Zamorano
Rehearsal director: Enrico Morelli

Produced by LAC Lugano Arte e Cultura
In co-production with MM Contemporary Dance Company
With the production collaboration of Fondazione Teatro Comunale di Modena