Cinderella

Jean-Christophe Maillot delivers a poignant meditation on the way in which people who disappear shape the future of those left behind. As soon as the curtains part, Cinderella appears, holding her deceased mother's white dress in her hands. This embodies the complexity of bereavement. In this new family, it is forbidden from dwelling over the past. What once was has become taboo under the influence of the stepmother and her two daughters.

Through these three characters, the choreographer breathes new life into the myth of the stepmother and her ugly daughters. This is no prudish, sour or bad-tempered woman, and nor are her daughters ugly or stupid. The three women in this new family are powerfully erotic and use their charm to get what they want. Jean-Christophe Maillot has created another lead character: the Fairy, a radiant reminder or magical reincarnation of Cinderella's mother. Thanks to the Fairy, Cinderella frees herself from the traps of the artificial world we first found her in.

In addition to a reflection on mourning, Cinderella is a funny, incisive take on a society crammed full of artifice, where the quest for pleasure strips its inhabitants of any sense of reality. Frenzied distraction, idleness, and boredom… In contrast to this, Cinderella is simplicity incarnate. Her bare foot becomes a symbol of ballet. It symbolises not only the simplicity and starkness of this young girl, but

Choreography: Jean-Christophe Maillot
Music: Serge Prokofiev
Scenography: Ernest Pignon-Ernest
Costumes: Jérôme Kaplan
Lighting: Dominique Drillot
Duration: 1h50

With the participation of the Monte-Carlo Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by David Garforth

Premiere held on April 3rd 1999, Salle Garnier Opéra de Monte-Carlo