Students of Newtown Centre of Classical Ballet & Voice (NCCB) performed The Nutcracker Suite ballet for packed audiences in Edmond Town Hall’s theater on Sunday, December 5, at noon and 2 pm. The show was part of the annual Holiday Festival presented by Newtown Youth & Family Services.

Tory Gozzi, artistic director of NCCB, told The Newtown Bee, “This year’s Nutcracker was my ninth year as the artistic director of the production. I took over for Jennifer Johnston Cebry, who was my mentor, back in 2013. I started dancing in this very Nutcracker myself as part of the Holiday Festival when I was in eighth grade … almost twenty years ago!”

She shares that the history of The Nutcracker Suite production has run even before her time with the dance company.

“The sets and tree are original to when Marsha Ismailoff Mark owned and operated the studio out of her Newtown residence on Mount Pleasant Road starting in 1969 … many of the costumes are original, too, including the re-debut of the ribbon candy costumes worn by our 7- and 8-year-olds in this year’s production,” Gozzi said.

She notes that Amanda Morrison, the mother of one of her dancers, was the person who returned the costumes to performance-quality this summer for them to use again.

“I’m so glad we did! It turned out to be one of my favorite new scenes,” Gozzi said. “Other costumes that are original to the production include the handmade soldier doll costume, Clara costume, Drosselmeier’s cape, and the Chinese court costumes.”

She adds that she educates the young dancers about the “sacredness” of these costumes and props, including how they have been utilized by generations of dancers before them.

Looking back on this year’s performance of The Nutcracker Suite, Gozzi said that “the kids did an absolutely marvelous job.”

Never before had there been so many young dancers in the Nutcracker as there were in this Holiday Festival performance — some as young as 3 years old — on stage playing “reindeer, angels, and mini Chinese,” Gozzi said.

“That decision was actually one of the main contributions I made to the show back in 2014,” Gozzi said. “In the past, only the older dancers who were part of our studio company presented the Nutcracker, but now we invite all the younger dancers from our studio to participate in the magic, too. It’s just been such a great addition both from the production angle and from an educational standpoint at the studio.”

She added that this year her 4-year-old daughter participated in her third year of the production and played an angel.

Overall, Gozzi said her students in The Nutcracker Suite ballet were “so professional, in control, energetic, [and] beautiful both in their dancing and how that live energy takes their acting up a notch, too — it’s so amazing to watch them grow and develop each year.”

Reporter Alissa Silber can be reached at alissa@thebee.com.