How far would you go to see your child’s dreams of being a star performer come true? How about if your own dreams of the same never did, and now you’re living vicariously through them? Most – hopefully – wouldn’t resort to murder, but in the world of Elsbeth, not only is it possible, it’s done, at the hands of this week’s guest star, Andrew Rannells. There’s no coal in this stocking: “A Hard Nut To Crack” brings ballet and blood together for a Season 3 episode that keeps the series on Santa’s nice list.
A Ghoulish Nutcracker Brings a Theater Director’s Life to a Grisly End in ‘Elsbeth’s “A Hard Nut To Crack”
“The Nutcracker. It’s pretty, it’s sweet, it’s tired. It’s time for a change.” So says avant-garde theater director Donovan Chase (Gabriel Ebert), who is proposing that The Midtown Ballet Company ditch its traditional production of The Nutcracker for something called Drosselmeyer’s Revenge, a modern pop-goth ballet about the horrors of puberty. His vision is a stripped-down production with one set piece he calls “The Contraption,” a large, ghoulish nutcracker with sharp metal teeth that open and close by electric sensors as dancers go in and out. There will be lots of blood and exactly zero children (in fact, there are two Claras, both played by dancers in their forties). Both Harris (Rannells) and Olivia (Celestine Rae), the company’s dance instructor, are appalled, with Harris taking particular exception to the latter, given his daughter Noelle (Willow McConnaughy) is up for the lead role of Clara this year. Unfortunately, they are the only two members of the ballet company’s board to vote against it. Drosselmeyer’s Revenge it is.
Harris and Olivia appear at a production meeting, where Donovan is explaining how The Contraption works. Actually, more demanding about how The Contraption should be working, which involves dancers getting far too close to the deathly contraption than is safe, with safety being the enemy of art. The ballet’s technical director, Keith (Brooks Ashmanskas), refuses to turn off the safety mechanism. “Unless there’s some catastrophe,” Olivia whispers, “This is our Nutcracker this year.” Well, Olivia, you’ve doomed Donovan, with Harris now carefully watching Keith entering his PIN to access the motion sensor-based safety mechanisms he has in place to move them slightly, a compromise he’s agreed to with Donovan.
The scene cuts to a physical therapist’s office, where Harris is getting some work done on his back. But once the therapist leaves the office, he sneaks out the window and runs to the ballet company. There, he hides in a large Mother Ginger set piece while Donovan is getting ready to go through a technical test of The Contraption. Harris slides over to the board, enters Keith’s PIN, and moves the sensors. And when Donovan goes to show The Contraption in action by going through the mouth, the mouth closes, and BANG! No encore for Donovan, as blood, both stage blood and his own, sprays everywhere. Content that Donovan is good and surely dead, Harris runs back to the therapist’s office and back through the window, just as the therapist arrives to turn off the machine.
The Curtains Close on Harris in ‘Elsbeth’s “A Hard Nut To Crack”
Elsbeth (Carrie Preston), Officer Hackett (Lindsay Mendez), and Detective Donnelly (Molly Price) arrive at the crime scene, and Elsbeth is immediately drawn to The Contraption. As she looks it over, Donnelly questions Keith, who insists that it was working fine, and explains that Donovan had wanted the mouth to open and close as dancers go through as a sign of puberty (anyone else actually want to see Drosselmeyer’s Revenge now?). But as he comes behind the mouth, he’s aghast to discover that the sensors have been moved, which is why the set piece ate Donovan for breakfast. One who is not aghast, however, is Harris, who flings open the door to his house, exclaiming proudly that Noelle got the part, now that The Nutcracker is back on.
Keith’s prints, however, are the only ones on the board, and it was his PIN that was used, so he is the obvious suspect. Elsbeth, however, isn’t so sure – Keith was absolutely devastated about the accident, more than he would be if he were the guilty party. But as they talk, Elsbeth realizes that the cancellation of The Nutcracker would have angered a lot of dance moms, anticipating that their children would be performing that year. Donnelly agrees, and adds that if dance moms are anything like hockey moms, then murder is certainly not out of the question. The pair go and talk to Olivia, who is in a class with her students. Seeing the young dancers in action, Elsbeth gleefully asks if she teaches adults, while the stoic Donnelly asks about why Donovan’s production was chosen. “To bring in new audiences,” Olivia explains, adding that only she and Harris opposed the move.
They then approach Harris, who is harshly critiquing Noelle’s dancing, pushing her to do better in order to land the part of Clara. Elsbeth is clearly upset by it, but they do have a job to do, and so they ask Harris about his whereabouts during the murder. He claims to have been at physical therapy at 3:00 pm, and didn’t leave there until 4:15. Elsbeth then comments on how well Noelle is dancing, prompting Harris to comment that he’s trying to help her get to her best, before reminiscing about how he himself was a dancer. That catches Elsbeth’s attention, and she pushes Harris, saying that Donovan’s rejection of The Nutcracker must have felt personal, an attack on his own daughter and preventing her from achieving her dream – or his – of being Clara.
The Curtains Close on Harris in ‘Elsbeth’s “A Hard Nut To Crack”
Harris doesn’t bite, so Elsbeth and Hackett look into his alibi, starting at the physical therapist’s office. There they run into Flash Rob (Adam Kaplan), the dance instructor who taught Elsbeth the “Hot Honey Rag” in “Something Blue.” He explains that the therapist works on a sliding scale and is notoriously busy with dancers unable to afford anything more (prompting Elsbeth to add, “I hear the arts are under attack,” a hilarious callback to “Poetic Justice”). A picture of Harris on the wall catches their attention, and Rob explains that Harris doesn’t dance anymore after getting injured, and he married into money. But if he doesn’t dance anymore, and married into money, why does he need physical therapy at all, and why one that is on a sliding scale notorious for running late?
Harris’ alibis aren’t checking out, so Elsbeth and Donnelly go to his home where they meet Rich (Mike Doyle), Harris’ husband, who is surprised to receive get well sugarplums from Elsbeth, and more surprised that Harris was even injured. Just then, Harris and Noelle come in with great news: Noelle got the part. But his joy turns to consternation upon seeing Elsbeth. They question him in a different room, where he explains that he got hurt ice skating, and didn’t tell his husband about it. Of course, no one can confirm that’s how he got injured, but they can’t prove it, either. They can, however, ask about why Keith said he had visited the workshop when he said he didn’t. Harris explains he did drop in, once, and confesses that he and Keith had dated in the past. After they leave, Rich approaches Harris and asks why the police showed up, to which he explains that Keith has been texting him repeatedly, and in the days leading up to Donovan’s death, he felt like Keith was going to do something bad. “Promise me you won’t tell the police,” Harris asks.
“Of course, I came to you directly,” Rich says to Elsbeth and Donnelly back at the precinct, and hands over Harris’ phone, which shows a number of texts from Keith… and it doesn’t look good. Donnelly is convinced it’s a wrap, but Elsbeth disagrees, believing that Harris was so fixated on Noelle being Clara that he could have done it. And his alibi is questionable anyway, with the clinic so busy that he could have shown up late for his appointment, and they’d never know. Elsbeth and Hackett head out to test their theory when they come across a camera crew filming for the matinee of Orphan Walk, a production of Donovan’s that uses live footage of an orphan walk on the sidewalk in front of, oddly enough, the physical therapist’s office. They get the video from the day of the murder, and Elsbeth is positive that it will confirm her suspicions when Harris isn’t on the video. Except Harris is on the video. Could Elsbeth be wrong?
Of course not. They actually find another video, one taken by one of the dancers in the Orphan Walk video that actually shows Harris sneaking out of the window and sneaking back in again later, more than enough time to get to the theater, and sabotage the control panel. Doesn’t prove he went to the theater, though, but what does is the spot of blood on the windowsill, stage blood that’s the proprietary concoction of the Midtown Ballet Company. Harris is done, but has one request. The scene cuts to Noelle as Clara, dancing on stage, with Harris watching from backstage in handcuffs, beaming proudly before being escorted away. Back at the precinct, Alec Bloom (Ivan Hernandez) congratulates the precinct for having collected the most toys for the NYPD toy drive. With the champagne flowing, Elsbeth resumes talking with Bloom when Wagner (Wendell Pierce) calls her into his office. Turns out Teddy (Ben Levi Ross) approached Wagner earlier about his concerns regarding Bloom’s claims about his homeless days as a youth, and he was right to be: Bloom never lived on the streets. Wagner just wants her to be careful, and as Wagner walks away, Elsbeth looks at Bloom, a mix of suspicion and sadness upon her face. Talk about a lousy Christmas present.
