Hundreds wait in the cold for Nutcracker tickets at Moscow’s fabled Bolshoi Theater

In Russia, ballet fans brave sub-zero temperatures for a chance to see The Nutcracker at Moscow’s famed Bolshoi Theatre.

ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:

In his recent year and address to the nation, Russian President Vladimir Putin called for patience with the war in Ukraine, saying the country would meet its goals. But in Moscow, the war can often seem far away, and NPR’s Charles Maynes found Russians determined to show patience of another kind.

CHARLES MAYNES, BYLINE: Ultimately, you can blame it on math. Seventeen hundred – that’s how many people fit in Moscow’s fabled Bolshoi Theater.

(SOUNDBITE OF BOLSHOI THEATRE ORCHESTRA PERFORMANCE OF TCHAIKOVSKY’S “THE NUTCRACKER SUITE, OP.71A: NO 2A, MARCH OF THE TOY SOLDIERS”)

MAYNES: Yet there are just 22 holiday performances of “The Nutcracker,” the beloved 19th-century ballet by Russian composer Pyotr Tchaikovsky, heard here in a Bolshoi performance from 2014 – so 1,700 seats, 22 performances, which leaves around 37,000 “Nutcracker” tickets for a city of some 12 million, meaning at the Bolshoi, as in life, there are winners but more often losers. Outside the theater, hundreds of Russians brave subzero temperatures deep into the night in hopes of securing their golden ticket.

ANDREI: (Speaking Russian).

MAYNES: “We’ve been standing here for a long time, since 9 this morning,” says Andrei, a Moscow university student who, like everyone in this story, agreed to speak on the condition his last name not appear in the American media. “But we’ll stay until the end,” he adds, “because ‘The Nutcracker’ is worth it.”

RAIA: (Speaking Russian).

MAYNES: “It’s such a beautiful ballet. I just wanted a chance to see it in my old age,” says Raia, a retired cleaner who has lived in Moscow most of her life but never been to a “Nutcracker” production. And this gets to another issue. The Bolshoi sells only 400 “Nutcracker” tickets per day. To get them, you have to stand in line. Most people I spoke with…