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77th annual edition remains a unique Christmas treat

BY MICHAEL SOMMERS

NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM

OFF BROADWAY REVIEW

The big white house of my childhood is gone; its porches and dormers long given way to commercial development along Kinderkamack Road in Oradell.

It's from that house I was taken as a four-year-old to see the Christmas show at Radio City Music Hall.

The relatives who took me now are gone as well — long gone, except in memory.

But Radio City Music Hall in all of its art deco glory remains and so does the holiday show, now grander than when I was a kid and known these days as the "Radio City Christmas Spectacular."

The 77th annual edition opened for the holiday season on Tuesday and — as always when the spectacle unfolds — I grew a bit misty recalling my first time there with my family back in the late 1950s. So be warned that these observations may be hazy with personal nostalgia.

But that's part of the charm of watching the show again as adult; remembering your childish awe at being in such a fabulous place with those high-kicking Rockettes and a Nativity scene far bigger than anything they did in church. And, of course, you remember the people who brought you there.

Aside from a couple of prize moments from the past, the "Spectacular" tends to change somewhat from year to year and the current edition is no exception. This year, heralded by singing ushers, the Rockettes in their reindeer drag (complete with light-up antlers) bring on Santa for a big hello before the audience dons their 3-D spectacles for the animated short. Introduced in 2001, the film has been since tweaked into a satisfyingly dizzying sleigh ride high above the metropolis.

Even more than Santa, the 72-member Rockettes troupe remains the vivacious life and soul of the 90-minute show and they precisely whirl through their numbers with customary excellence: Sharply tapping out "The Twelve Days of Christmas," elegantly posing on a Gray Line bus tour around the city, gaily flopping about as rag dolls, ringing bells in Santa disguise and, best of all, drilling through their classic "Wooden Soldiers" routine.

Spectators in the cheaper seats at the rear of the hall and upstairs get a better view of the intricate patterns the Rockettes weave while marching about in those white-red-yellow-black soldier costumes designed way back when by a pre-Hollywood Vincente Minnelli. As ever, the sequence climaxes with the soldiers' wonderfully slow-motion mass fall across the length of the stage.

Another great crowd-pleaser that remains is the abbreviated "Nutcracker Suite" amusingly performed by dancers garbed as various adorable bears.

Sure, maybe this stuff looks cornball to some people, but somehow the mad mix of these hugely festive numbers performed under the great, golden sunrise arch of the Music Hall proscenium achieves an only-in-New York resonance that still thrills. If you've never taken the kids to see the show, it's high time to start making some personal memories for them as well as for you.

Give yourself extra time to look around the Music Hall, which is a visual treat unto itself. Make sure you check out the dazzling rest rooms in the lower lobby that look like something out of a Fred-and-Ginger movie. Beware of the pricy concessions (note my Tuesday rant regarding "Wintuk" run by the same management at Madison Square Garden). Remember that the Christmas tree and ice skating rink at Rockefeller Center is situated only half a block away.

Here come the holidays, folks, and there's no better place on earth to begin them than at the venerable, ever-memorable "Spectacular" at Radio City Music Hall.

"The Radio City Christmas Spectacular" continues through Dec. 30 at the Music Hall, 50th Street at Avenue of the Americas, New York. Call (212) 307-1000 or visit www.radiocitychristmas.com.