Marina Nebro: Arts and Culture

Sleeping Beauty Kept Me Awake

I may frequent theatre and music concerts often, but dance performances are definitely a rarity in my cultural portfolio – ballets especially. In the past, I have seen Swan Lake, Sylvia, and Les Ballets Trocadero de Monte Carlo. I enjoyed all of these performances, but Matthew Bourne’s rendition of Sleeping Beauty at New York City Center was by far my favorite. Was it the costumes, the make-up, the wigs, the dancing, the dancers, the music, the set, the lighting, the puppetry, or something else that made this production so special? I believe it was the story.

I didn’t grow up with fairytales or Disney princess movies as a child, and for this reason I don’t know much about the story of Sleeping Beauty except for the obvious fact that there is a beautiful woman sleeping, waiting to be kissed by Prince Charming. In his Gothic adaptation, Bourne modernizes the story for a contemporary audience. He says in an interview with Diane Nottle, “The love story didn’t seem to be strong, partly because the prince wakes her up after 100 years, they kiss, and then they fall in love. There’s no story there, really. I don’t buy that for a modern audience.” Instead of a Prince, Bourne makes Aurora’s love interest a handsome gameskeeper named Leo (Dominic North), a young man of lower status that throws complications into the early scenes. With this new addition, the audience is able to connect with the couple from the get-go, and the entire story becomes a lot more believable. Bourne says that in the original ballet, the only conflict occurs at the very beginning. He adds the character of Caradoc, the son of the dark fairy who casts the original spell on Aurora (Ashley Shaw). Cleverly, Tom Jackson Greaves is cast as both Carabosse (the dark fairy) and her son! The plot surrounding this character is a bit confusing, though. Is he avenging his mother’s untimely death? Does he fall in love with the beautiful Aurora who doesn’t reciprocate the feelings? In Act IV, Aurora’s Wedding, is he planning on wedding her or killing her? He does wield a knife after all! One new addition to Bourne’s version of Sleeping Beauty is the inclusion of vampiric faeries. It is not until the moment before intermission that we realize who the magical and mysterious winged creatures are who seem to be watching over the lovely princess from the moment of her infancy. Because Leo and Aurora are childhood sweethearts, there has to be a logical explanation for him staying around for 100 years while she sleeps and to later awaken her with a kiss – at the end of Act II, Count Lilac (Christopher Marney) the King of the Faeries, gives Leo this lasting power.

The sets and costumes, both designed by Lez Brotherston, were phenomenal! Brotherston had to cope with the changing eras throughout the storyline as the ballet started in 1890 (Act I), took place in 1911 with Aurora’s coming of age party (Act II), and finally travelled 100 years into the future to 2011 (Acts III & IV). Like Swan Lake, but unlike Sylvia, the costumes were not traditional ballet tutus and tights, but rather beautifully constructed dresses and suits. The designer deals with the change in time superbly, as the costumes after the intermission still reference the past, while utilizing modern garb such as skinny jeans and sneakers. In the set, the use of mirrors on either side of the stage give the illusion of a much larger space, and heighten the mysterious and magical feeling as the faeries danced on conveyer belt platform, gracefully transporting from one side of the stage to the other. The lighting design by Paule Constable illuminated the stage as if the moon were truly hovering in the foggy sky and as if the sun was really shining on Aurora’s outdoor coming of age party.

With the phenomenal comes the mediocre, I must say. The trend with many theatrical and dance productions these days, to save on costs and expenditures, is to eliminate a live pit orchestra and substitute it with sound recording. There is something lost when there is no visible conductor’s baton. The audience can’t get excited as it hears the orchestra tune up, or when the entire hall quiets down as the conductor walks onto his podium. Matthew Bourne’s choreography was a modern take on ballet. I missed seeing the ballerinas dance on point, and I kept waiting for powerful jumps and spins that only seemed to occur early on between Aurora and Leo. I appreciated the amount of pantomime – not too much and not too little – and sitting in the second row (BB), I was able to see the dancers’ faces perfectly. Perhaps with the more contemporary movements, the dancers were able to evoke more emotion. In Act I, Baby Aurora 1890, the use of puppetry for the infanta took attention away from the strong use of pantomime early on, but as soon as Aurora grew up, the miming subsided. According to the Director’s Notes, as time progressed in the storyline, the style of dancing changed as well. There was definitely a lot more edge in Caradoc’s final dance scene in Act IV.

All in all, I enjoyed Sleeping Beauty for its strong narrative aspects and artistic interpretation. Matthew Bourne really brought the story into the 21st century with the addition of characters and the removal of clichés such as love at first sight. The plot was strengthened by the extravagant costumes and grandiose set. The dancers, especially Tom Jackson Greaves, moved with enormous emotion making me feel very lucky to be craning my neck so close to the stage. I would recommend this New Adventures production for anyone – music lovers, art lover, dance lovers, and story lovers. There is something in it for everyone!

Sleeping Beauty
New York City Center
October 25, 2013

Marina B. Nebro