Matthew Bourne's Sleeping Beauty

Synopsis

Perrault's timeless fairy tale, about a young girl cursed to sleep for one hundred years, was turned into a legendary ballet by choreographer, Marius Petipa, in 1890. Bourne takes this as his starting point, setting the Christening of Aurora, the story's heroine, in the year of the ballets first performance; the height of the Fin-de-Siecle period when fairies, vampires and decadent opulence fed the gothic imagination. As Aurora grows into a young woman, we move forwards in time to the more rigid, uptight Edwardian era; a mythical golden age of long summer afternoons, croquet on the lawn and new dance crazes. Years later, awakening from her century long slumber, Aurora finds herself in the modern day; a world more mysterious and wonderful than any Fairy story! Matthew Bourne's haunting new scenario is a gothic tale for all ages; the traditional tale of good vs. evil and rebirth is turned upside-down, creating a supernatural love story, across the decades, that even the passage of time itself cannot hinder.

Our Review:

Barbara Maxwell - 7 May 2013

Matthew Bourne’s Sleeping Beauty, now showing at the Bristol Hippodrome, is an evening of sheer delight and pleasure. From the opening scenes to the dramatic finale the audience is taken into an enchanted world, and judging by the expressions on the faces of the audience leaving the theatre an unforgettable evening.

Sleeping Beauty is the third in the trilogy of Tchaikovsky’s ballets from Matthew Bourne following on from the hugely successful Nutcracker and Swan Lake, and like the those before, he has again surpassed himself with this ballet.

In this version, the well know story opens with the immortal words “Once Upon a time there was a King and Queen who had not been blessed with a child”. The ballet, set in 1890, then goes on to show the royal couple, danced by Edwin Ray and Kerry Biggin approaching the dark fairy Carabosse - wonderfully portrayed by Adam Maskell - for help. Their quest is rewarded and they are ble...

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Latest User Review

David - 13 May 2013:

As always with a MB production, the stylistic elements are jaw-dropping, BUT, this time there is a complete absence of the sublime, heart-swelling moments normally associated with MB. As a consequence, SB is clever, quirky, precise... but fails to move. ...

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