Cinderella
Royal Opera House, in rep until 5 June
I know that old fairy tales are not popular or fashionable any more. But last Saturday, at the opening of the Royal Ballet’s new run of Frederick Ashton’s Cinderella, I was shocked to overhear two nicely behaved children ask their grandparents why the good fairy had asked Cinders to fetch a pumpkin and why there were dancers dressed as white mice pulling her coach. It’s true that, in Ashton’s superb choreographic adaptation of the old story, the transformation scene is not as graphic as it is in Walt Disney’s animated film. Yet the youngsters’ questions were symptomatic of the cultural, psychological and political trends that inform children’s upbringing today. Ignorance, however, can be bliss: not knowing the story can add greatly to the enchantment created by theatre, as was demonstrated by the ecstatic noises that the children uttered throughout the evening.
I am not ashamed to admit that I, too, enjoyed the performance and fell under its simple, captivating spell. Like those children, I laughed at the well-known antics of the two Ugly Sisters, portrayed by Luke Heydon and ballet legend Wayne Sleep with dramatic vibrancy and not a single hint of vulgarity or drag-queen campness. And like a child I found myself totally won over and enraptured by Alina Cojocaru’s interpretation of the rags-to-riches heroine. Hers is one of the most credible renditions of the role I have seen in years. Purists might object to her excessively smooth and neo-romantic approach to the jagged angularity of the choreography, which highlights Ashton’s unique response to Prokofiev’s captivating score. But I think that such unusual smoothness adds greatly to what comes across as an enthralling and dramatically powerful reading of the central role.
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