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Cinderellas (plural)


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I was very interested in the announcement earlier this week that ABT and Boston Ballet were adding the Kudelka Cinderella to their repertories, especially the comment by Mikko Nissinen that they'd been offered sets and costumes for the Ashton version but chose not to take them (the implication was that they didn't want the Ashton, not that they didn't want the sets, etc) I've seen the Ashton on tape, but don't know anything about the Kudelka beyond the reviews. Has anyone here seen both, and can you speak about the differences?

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Sandi -

I haven't yet seen Kudelka's version, but I'll enclose two different quotes from the Toronto Star's critic William Littler.

From the 1999 educational series Footnotes:

"We can be charmed by individual elements, but somehow, it's not a ballet that seems to get rave reviews. It's a concept that people haven't quite lived up to. " 

"Why doesn't the ballet work? I don't know. Maybe it's because we don't have mice the way we used to. "

And from his current review of Kudelka's production (Toronto Star, April 25, '05)

By comparison, even such well-known versions as those of Frederick Ashton and Ben Stevenson (the latter danced by the National Ballet a decade ago) look rather superficial now and far less attuned to the darker sides of Prokofiev's music.

[snip]

This is a Cinderella for today.

There's more in the Star review that describes the differences, and Littler is evidently one who would prefer a darker Cinderella. I've only heard praise from my Canadian friends for the production, but my guess is that I would still prefer the Ashton - but it took my a few viewings and some work to like that version as well. In 1997, when the Royal Ballet came to NYC, I saw it and had no idea what to look for or what to make of it.

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I haven't seen Ashton's Cinderella, so I can't comment on that. I've only seen the Stevenson version that NBoC used to perform.

But Kudelka's version really isn't that "darK"- certainly not when you compare it to his other works. It has a fresh sense of humour (I doubt that an alcoholic step-mother would find her way into any other production) and a different angle in terms of the story. At the end of the ballet, Cinderella and the Prince have a quiet, intimate wedding and retreat to their garden. Instead of climbing the hierarchy of social class, Cinderella escapes from it.

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