by Sheryl Flatow

One of the advantages in creating a production of Cinderella is that everyone knows the story: the choreographer can be assured that each plot point will be readily understood. But that advantage can also be a disadvantage: if everyone knows the story, then where’s the surprise? How do you make it fresh? Where’s the magic?

James Kudelka pondered similar questions as he set about staging Cinderella, which premiered with The National Ballet of Canada to great acclaim in 2004 and opens Boston Ballet’s 42nd Season on October 13. “I questioned everything,†he says. Ultimately, he invigorated every aspect of the production—the story, the movement and the design—with a witty, contemporary perspective, and choreographed an inspired work that is romantic, humorous, touching, poetic and fanciful.

Kudelka made two decisions early in the creative process that infused his approach to the ballet.

“I didn’t want it just to be a rags-to-riches story,†he says, “which is only about free money.†Instead, he created a Cinderella with a connection to the earth, a romantic who doesn’t dream of finding a prince, but of finding her true love. Yes, her true love turns out to be a prince, but this prince is more at home in a garden than he is in a palace. He and Cinderella are soul mates who transform each other.
Equally important was Kudelka’s decision to set the ballet in the 1920s. “We were really concerned that the ballet be grounded in North America in the ’20s,†he says. “We never say it’s set in the ’20s, but it is. I was sure that was when the score was written, and I was shocked to discover that Prokofiev wrote it so much later [in the early ’40s]. But to me the score has the sound of the ’20s; it really feels trapped in the Deco world.â€

Not surprisingly, the Art Deco aesthetic—geometric shapes, streamlined, and elegantly decorative—became the main inspiration for David Boechler’s sets and costumes. But Cinderella’s attachment to nature is also very much reflected in the designs, as is the fantasy element inherent to the story.

The ballet opens in the kitchen of the house that Cinderella shares with her stepfamily. The kitchen would look very real, except that the scale is oversized. “Right away you know there’s something different about the story,†says Charles Heightchew, Boston Ballet’s manager of costumes and wardrobe. “Outside of that there are show scrims. They’re ovoid-shaped with a Deco pattern, abstracted floral in oranges and yellows and browns. The colors are very real, and heightened in the manner of the Deco style. The first couple of legs around the stage look like beautiful Japanese Deco pottery.

“The drop for the garden has overgrown vegetables, giant-sized. The ballroom scene is cooler, with oversized paper globes hung across the stage.â€

The women’s costumes for the ballroom scene are reminiscent of Erté, one of the artists most closely associated with the Art Deco movement. All the women, except Cinderella, are dressed in gowns of black, silver and white, with a ’20s silhouette. “The gowns are very stylish, made of satins, silks, tulle and lamé,†says Heightchew. “About 50 different fabrics were used for those dresses. They have a high sheen to them, very sparkly and cold looking. The Stepsisters wear the same Deco-style dresses, but they’re a little cartoonish and exaggerated. Those two girls have some money, but they don’t necessarily have taste.â€

Cinderella makes her entrance to the ball in a glamorous period coat. “It’s a beautiful Deco coat in silver and pale mauve, with a white fur collar and a little fishtail train,†says Heightchew. “The coat is chiffon with lamé print, so it has a little bit of a sheen to it. The lining is a lightweight silk. It’s very soft and fluid and falls from the shoulders and hips, so it has that beautiful, long line that you get in the Deco style.â€

When Cinderella removes her coat, she reveals a dress very different than the gowns worn by the other women in the scene. “Her dress is very simple,†says Heightchew. “It’s made of stretch tulle, mauve with a peach underlayer. The two layers give the dress a slight glow, even thought it’s not a shiny fabric. The top is very fitted, but the skirt is fluid. There are little bits of flowers sewn on the dress, and she has beautiful little silk flowers in her hair with a small tiara.â€

The contrast between Cinderella’s dress and the stunning, austere gowns worn by the other women reinforces how down-to-earth she is. “The idea is that she’s not showy and she isn’t trying to be like other people,†says Heightchew. “She likes the hearth and the home; that’s what means something to her. She doesn’t want to become a princess. In the end, they marry in the garden rather than the palace.â€

The nature motif manifests itself in other ways. Although the garment worn by the Godmother is out of an entirely different period, the costume subtly strengthens her bond with Cinderella. “She wears a layered, late Edwardian day dress that has a bit of a bustle to it,†says Heightchew. “She’s very grandmotherly and soft and approachable and comforting. She wears this beautiful nest of a hat, and her coat is brocaded and has a little bit of a textured pattern to it. Around the collar is embroidered net in a floral pattern, and there are garden elements on her costume, so you see the connection to Cinderella.â€

The ballet is also inhabited by garden creatures and Pumpkinheads—yes, Pumpkinheads—who add to the fantasy element of the ballet. The Pumpkinheads, in fact, are instrumental in one of the ballet’s most striking and clever moments (not to be revealed here). “When you choreograph a story ballet, whether it’s Cinderella or Swan Lake or The Nutcracker, it’s all about the details,†says Kudelka. “Every single detail has to be figured out.

The details make Kudelka’s production of Cinderella enchanting.

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