I attended the matinee performance on Saturday 24th November 2012 as Matthew Bourne's gothic fairy tale brought the magic of Tchaikovsky to Norwich Theatre Royal. Perrault's timeless fairy tale about a young girl cursed to sleep for one hundred years, was turned into a ballet by Marius Petipa in 1890. Matthew Bourne takes this as his starting point, setting the christening of Aurora in the year of the ballet's first performance. This was a period when fairies, vampires and decadent opulence fed the gothic imagination.
As Aurora grows into a young woman we move forward to a mythical golden age of long summer afternoons, cricket and new dance crazes. Years later, awakening from her century long slumber, Aurora finds herself in the modern day. This haunting new scenario creates a supernatural love story across the decades, that even the passage of time itself cannot hinder.
This was a magical afternoon at Norwich Theatre Royal as once again Matthew Bourne has done something different and unique to a traditional classic ballet. There was lots of fun in this tale of good versus evil as Sleeping Beauty was turned into a gothic tales for all ages.
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