“Cinderella”
March 15, 2014
“C. to C. (Close to Chuck) Reborn” “Resonance” “Bella Figura”
February 21,2014
Boston Ballet
Boston Opera House
Boston, MA
by Dale Brauner
copyright 2014 by Dale Brauner
This spring, Sir Frederick Ashton proffered a sparkling glass slipper to Boston Ballet in the shape of “Cinderella” and it fit perfectly. “Cinderella,” set to music by Sergei Prokofiev, was Ashton’s first original full-length ballet, debuting at the Sadler’s Wells Ballet in 1948. Former Royal Ballet dancer Wendy Ellis Somes directed and supervised this production, which featured David Walker’s beautiful and simple costumes and sets (borrowed from The Joffrey Ballet).
The ballet follows the fairy tale pretty clearly. Cinderella’s mother is dead and her father has remarried a woman with two silly and petty daughters. We don’t see the stepmother in this version but the pair of stepsisters take care of the henpecking of Cinderella’s father and bullying of Cinderella.