ON STAGE
What: Cinderella at the Fairy Tale Ball
Where: Royal Theatre
When: Matinee 2 p.m. today
Tickets: $25 to $50. 250-386-6121
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Paul Destrooper's newly unwrapped version of Cinderella, created for Ballet Victoria this yuletide, offers plenty of fanciful flourishes, playful personalities -- from Puss in Boots and Alice, to a Charlie Chaplin character -- and is capital family entertainment.
Set in turn-of-the-last-century Victoria, the artistic director has included a large projection screen showing moody garden stills, film clips and more. He also injects a note of film-making in the double role of a film director/fairy godmother and weaves several unexpected freeze-frame sequences into the action.
One of the most appealing scenes is in Act II when the legislative buildings, outlined in twinkling lights, appear on the backdrop and the ballroom is filled with a flurry of high-speed spins, kicks and leaps as performers rocket across the stage.
The first scene suits the Cinders theme, with its ash and grey colour scheme, but the lighting by Adam Wilkinson and costumes by Jane Wood soon turn on the colour with art nouveau flair. The self-indulgent ugly sisters -- Yuka Sakuma and Christie Wood -- are dressed in a hideously garish collection of turquoise, mustard and purple, although step-mum Roberta Baseggio, a guest artist who hails from Rome, is almost too gorgeous and patrician for her role.
Mice are always a hit on stage, and the young performers from Island Dance Studio are pleasantly plump as they scurry around with well-schooled purpose. They're part of a clever routine in which the fairy godmother, danced by the stylish and graceful Megan Cox, implores Cinderella not to forget to leave the ball at midnight. The smart choreography has the dancers mimicking the hands of a clock with a stop-start motion.
Fairies and Spanish dancers display their classical technique in demanding variations while principals Andrea Bayne and Robb Beresford perform the roles of Cinderella and the Prince with regal style. Their duets are charming. She is delicate and girlish, light and soft, while he seems barely contained by the stage at times, a tall strong prince who can sweep her up in slow-motion, to live happily ever after.
An unanticipated delight was a lobby filled with little girls pretending to be ballerinas, during the two intermissions.
