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The Sleeping Beauty

Choreography

Marius Petipa

Composer

Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky

Music

Op. 66, 1889

Costume Design

Paul Tazewell

Lighting Design

Reed Nakayama

Scenic Design

Preston Singletary

Staging

Peter Boal (2025)
Doug Fullington (2025)

Cast

Full company and students

Running Time

2 hours and 40 minutes

Premiere

January 31, 2025
Pacific Northwest Ballet

Production Concept & Additional Choreography

Peter Boal

Production Design

Wendall K. Harrington

Puppetry Design

Basil Twist

Associate Scenic Design

Charlene Hall

PNB’s world premiere of The Sleeping Beauty is principally supported by Leslie & Tachi Yamada, Susan Brotman, Glenn Kawasaki, Chap & Eve Alvord, Peter & Peggy Horvitz, along with many generous individuals.

Since its creation in 1890 in St. Petersburg, Russia, The Sleeping Beauty has been a pillar of the classical ballet repertory. Its score by Tchaikovsky and choreography by Marius Petipa represent one of the greatest collaborative achievements in music and dance in the 19th century. Pacific Northwest Ballet’s production of The Sleeping Beauty is also the product of collaboration: a team of artists assembled and led by Artistic Director Peter Boal has come together to create a new version of the enduring classic.

Peter’s vision for The Sleeping Beauty sees the ballet set in a timeless fantasy world inspired by the natural beauty of the Pacific Northwest and Northwest Coast art. First-time scenic designer Preston Singletary, working with associate scenic designer Charlene Hall, has combined his expertise as a glass artist with elements of his Tlingit cultural heritage to create the signature scenic element of the production, the Eagle Staircase. Preston also suggested the association between two characters found in Tlingit stories—Eagle, a symbol of power, and Raven, a shapeshifting, troublemaking trickster—and The Sleeping Beauty’s Lilac Fairy and Carabosse, who represent the yin and yang of fairy godmotherhood. The ballet’s monarchs, originally “King Florestan XIV” (a nod to the French King Louis XIV) and “The Queen,” have been renamed by Peter as King and Queen Papillon, both a play on the term “monarch” (“papillon” means “butterfly” in French) and a contribution to the production’s diverse menagerie of nature-inspired characters.

In the spirit of The Sleeping Beauty’s fantasy setting, costume designer Paul Tazewell has drawn on multiple inspirations. Most significantly, he has incorporated formlines—flowing patterns of lines that are a fundamental design element of Northwest Coast art and a prominent feature of Preston’s glass art—into nearly every costume design. Some of the formlines have been hand drawn by Preston, while others are more abstract representations. The scenery and costumes are augmented by the projected animation and still images designed by Wendall K. Harrington, and Reed Nakayama’s lighting design serves not only to enhance the dancing but to guide the audience as they follow the story. Puppetry designer Basil Twist has added a further dimension to The Sleeping Beauty with his unique designs for Carabosse’s nest of mice and the Ogre in pursuit of Hop o’ My Thumb and his brothers.

To stage the dances, we’ve used choreographic notes made by Nikolai Sergeyev, one of Petipa’s rehearsal directors at the Imperial Ballet, during 1903–1906. Sergeyev’s notes document Petipa’s choreography, mime, and stage action and over the years have contributed to the rich history and longevity of The Sleeping Beauty. They were used by Sergeyev to restage The Sleeping Beauty for the Imperial Ballet at St. Petersburg’s fabled Mariinsky Theatre during the years following Petipa’s death, for the historic 1921 Ballets Russes production in London, and for the 1939 Royal Ballet (then called Vic-Wells Ballet) production that re-opened Covent Garden after World War II in 1946. (The Royal Ballet production was also the basis for Ronald Hynd’s staging of The Sleeping Beauty danced by PNB during the years 2001–2019.)

The choreographic notes allowed us to bypass decades of changes made to The Sleeping Beauty and brought us closer to what Petipa created. We’ve not only restored steps but also the speed and musicality that more faithfully represent Tchaikovsky’s score. Our goal has been to remain faithful to Petipa’s choreography while allowing the dancers to move in ways that feel natural to them today.

As we worked with both the notes and the ballet’s 1890 libretto, we found elements in the original conception of the story that seem a better fit with today’s sensibilities than some of the revisions made to The Sleeping Beauty in the 20th century. For example, Aurora is twenty years old when we first meet her, not sixteen (a change made for the 1921 production). When she is introduced to her four suitors, her father makes clear that her choice of marriage partner is her own. More broadly, we found in the fairytale a story that embodies a range of metaphysical ideas about existence, personhood, destiny, causality, space, time, and the balance of good and evil. Carabosse, as it turns out, isn’t the ultimate evil. Once her curse is mitigated and seen through to its end, balance is restored. She attends the wedding of Aurora and Désiré—why would the court risk not inviting her again? Aurora and Désiré, each a model of exemplary character, have their own destinies: Aurora’s destiny is to bring her family and her kingdom forward one hundred years in time, thus intersecting with Désiré’s coming of age and allowing him to find purpose as the awakener and ultimately the partner of the Sleeping Beauty.

The role of Aurora is an unusual one in the canon of 19th-century ballet because it is expressed almost solely through dance instead of the usual combination of dance and mime. Rather than an ordinary human or fantastical creature, Aurora represents idealism and aspiration. Her outer beauty surely represents her inner goodness. In a stroke of theatrical genius, Petipa structured each scene of the ballet around a centerpiece dance that arrives at a climax in which Aurora, placed at centerstage, is glorified—first as an infant blessed by her godmothers at her christening in Scene 1, then as an idealized young person full of joy and confidence during the Rose Adagio in Scene 2, as a goddess heralding the dawn of a new age during Désiré’s vision in Scene 3, and finally as a consummate being who has fulfilled her destiny in Scene 5.

But although Aurora is different from the leads in other heritage ballets, she is the same in an important way. Like Giselle, Swanilda, Paquita, and a host of others, Aurora drives the action and the narrative, overwhelming the stage with energy from her first entrance. Even in her sleep, she actively draws Désiré to her, and later she declares her love for him during their wedding duet. Aurora isn’t a passive heroine, but an active, lively, exhilarating character who we believe can still inspire and uplift us today.

Program notes by Doug Fullington.

The Story

There’s a place along the western oceanic coast where madrone trees bend gently toward the sea. Lofty eagles soar above while mischievous ravens dart below and the monarch butterflies are known to return to this spot each spring, boasting brilliant black and saffron wings. In this mythical place, a tiny baby was born. Her name was Aurora.

You ask when she was born? It was on a day when the dawn was more beautiful than ever before, a specific day right in the middle of a time long ago and a distant future. On this day, the dawn glow brought radiant sunshine and elaborate celebrations in the house of Queen and King Papillion. For many years, the Papillons had lived happily in the realm of the eagle, with only one wish: they longed for a child who promised longevity and good fortune for their family. Aurora was the fulfillment of their wish.

Catalabutte oversaw all court activities at the house of Papillon, or so he believed. His trusty, and at times untrusty, footman assisted with plans and preparations for festivities. I cannot tell you how many hours were spent reviewing the guest list. All the good fairies had been invited, including the wondrous and benevolent Lilac Fairy. Each would bring a gift for Princess Aurora. These offerings would allow Aurora to fulfill her destiny. The Lilac Fairy was to be the last to present her gift. In addition to the fairies, there were oh-so-many members of the court, honored guests from nearby lands, countless pages, and beloved members of the Papillon family. Yes, the guest list was checked and rechecked by King, Queen, and footman, and then checked once more. No one had been forgotten, or so they thought.

Well, they thought wrong. They had neglected to invite the grumpiest of all the fairies, Carabosse. Oh, what a temper she had! Even before her thunderous entrance into the hall on that once-sunny day, clouds covered the sky, and the darkest of shadows pushed its way across the land. Carabosse was a shapeshifter and often traveled as a raven, which represented her side of the realm. Guests saw the raven’s shadow approach, then her slithery mice scurried across the floor, and finally her chariot trundled into the Celebration Hall. A feeling of doom spread across the room.

Now, you must understand Carabosse was part of the Papillon family, too. She was not evil, just grumpy, and especially so since she had not been included. Her anger got the better of her on that fateful day when she decided to put a curse on baby Aurora. She proclaimed before the Queen, King, fairies, pages, and distinguished guests that on Aurora’s twentieth birthday she would indeed embody all the gifts the other fairies had given, but she would also prick her finger on a spindle and die. Then she laughed.

On this most glorious day of joy and celebration, there could be no greater shock, no more tragic omen. This was unthinkable, even for Carabosse. But one fairy had yet to bestow her gift on Aurora. It was the Lilac Fairy. Did I mention she was both wondrous and benevolent? What I may not have mentioned was Carabosse could be a bit of a thorn in Lilac’s side, and let me tell you, the reverse was true, too. You might say Lilac rained on Carabosse’s parade in that moment, but it felt more like the clouds cleared and the sun returned to those gathered in the hall. The Lilac Fairy’s prophecy honored Carabosse’s prediction to a point. Back then, fairies couldn’t just overrule other fairies. Aurora indeed would thrive and blossom until her twentieth birthday, when she would prick her finger on a spindle, but she would not die. Instead, she would sleep. She would slumber along with all the people throughout the land for one hundred years, while serpentine vines would enshroud everything and everyone.

Whose prediction came true? Excellent question. Whether you tell time by tides or timepiece, sundial or seasons, let us step twenty years into the future, when we find ourselves at the princess’s birthday celebration. Though some in the realm worried about the day, most lived in the glow of the house of Papillon awaiting Aurora’s milestone. The King and Queen fretted when a clutch of knitters was spotted that morning on the esplanade with spindles. You see, spindles had been banned from the realm twenty years prior, and yet there they were. Offending spindles were confiscated, and naughty knitters were scolded, but not punished, thanks to the Queen’s mercy.

The Ceremonial Hall was resplendent in anticipation of the occasion. Elegantly dressed heirs from neighboring lands attended the grand celebration. Guests wondered whether Aurora might fancy one of them. Her proud parents, the Queen and King, understood she should marry for love and agreed the choice was hers to make. How splendid each heir was! Aurora was honored by their presence and enchanted by their acquaintance, but true love eluded her on that day.

Another knitter appeared and offered Aurora a beguiling birthday gift. It was a spindle. Aurora had never seen one. She was curious and at an age when curiosity bests parents’ concerns. Suddenly, the spindle pricked her finger, just as a dark cloud crossed the sun. Some say they saw the shadow of a raven appear moments before the knitter revealed her identity. Yes, you guessed it—Carabosse. Some worried Carabosse’s curse had come true, and the beautiful princess would soon die, but others knew the prediction of the Lilac Fairy would prevail and the story of destiny was now in motion. Princess Aurora, the Papillon family, and everyone in the hall soon fell asleep as silent vines started to grow.

Another sundial reset and many moons later, reaching one hundred years into the future, we encounter a kindhearted prince named Désiré, who longed to find his purpose in life. While picnicking in the woods with his hunting party, a fussy duchess, an overbearing baroness, his squire, several hunters and huntresses, and some locals who love to dance, Désiré sought solace on the banks of the River of Time. Here he encountered the Lilac Fairy, who presented him with a vision of Aurora. At first, the princess was sleeping, and in her repose, she was oh-so-beautiful. One might have even called her a sleeping beauty. The prince was enraptured by the vision as she beckoned to him. Quite smitten, he declared his love for Aurora to the Lilac Fairy and implored her to take him to the sleeping princess.

The Lilac Fairy seemed to know exactly what to do next. She understood our kindhearted prince had just found his purpose in life. She offered him some sound advice and a Sword of Destiny. The two boarded her glittering boat, helmed by her page, and they set off down the River of Time.

The Lilac Fairy brought Désiré to the Papillon home in no time. Their house was unrecognizable under the web of serpentine vines. Désiré did not know what to do. The Lilac Fairy urged him to heed her sound advice, and he did. He swung the Sword of Destiny at one of the vines. Dozens of twisty tendrils started to retreat—rising and falling away—revealing a clearer vision of the sleeping Princess Aurora. Désiré then asked the Lilac Fairy’s permission to awaken the princess with a tender kiss. She encouraged him to do so as destiny took hold. Désiré scaled the legendary Eagle Staircase with the beautiful princess asleep atop the royal landing. He approached and gently placed a kiss on her forehead. The princess awoke, and in that moment, there was an explosion of butterflies throughout the Ceremonial Hall and across the land.

What’s left of this happy ending? Well, there was a wedding, and it was a celebration like none other. Dear old Catalabutte returned as the royal planner of festivities, and this time he had done everything correctly. Yes, he even invited Carabosse, who was almost unrecognizable, wrapped in a new mood and carrying a warm heart. Glittering jewels and precious metals dance for the court. Princess Florine, the winged Blue Bird, the White Cat, Puss in Boots, Red Riding Hood and a Wolf who resembled Catalabutte all danced for a court of fairytale characters. Just before the wedding dance, we see Hop o’ my Thumb and his siblings steal the towering Ogre’s boots. Carabosse loved and laughed at the angry Ogre, and we wonder if she saw herself in him. Aurora and Désiré performed the wedding pas de deux. During the dance, Aurora declared her love for Désiré before her parents and all the court. Their bond was as beautiful as the dawn and as enduring as the day. It was a proud moment for the Papillons. From that day forth, everyone in the land lived happily ever after.

Artist Biographies

Basil Twist

Basil Twist is a director, designer, and puppeteer who furthers the artistry and technical craft of puppetry through his diverse range of works. His experiments with the materials and techniques of puppetry explore the boundaries of the animate and inanimate, the abstract and the figurative. His work ranges from classic stories to abstract visualizations of orchestral music and are informed by puppetry traditions from around the world. In dance, Twist has created new work with Pilobolus, Jane Comfort, Joe Goode Performance Group, and Christopher Wheeldon for Cinderella, The Winter’s Tale, and a new Nutcracker for Joffrey Ballet. Most recently, he created the sets and puppetry for Dorothy and The Prince of Oz with Ballet MET and Tulsa Ballet.

Charlene Hall

Charlene Hall is a watercolor artist and scenic designer. She’s collaborated with Pacific Northwest Ballet for over four decades, and her painting is seen in PNB productions of Giselle, Coppélia, and George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker®. Her original scenic designs include: Theme and Variations (George Balanchine, 1985), Orpheus Portrait (Kent Stowell, 1990), Le Corsaire: A Pirate’s Tale (Marius Petipa, 2016).

Doug Fullington

Doug Fullington was Audience Education Manager and Assistant to Artistic Director Peter Boal at Pacific Northwest Ballet (PNB) in Seattle. During his tenure at PNB he was responsible for developing PNB’s audience education programs and was also on the consulting staff of Pacific Northwest Ballet School as dance historian.

Doug is a fluent reader of Stepanov choreographic notation and has contributed reconstructed dances to The Daughter of Pharaoh for the Bolshoi Ballet (2001); “Le jardin animé” from Le Corsaire for PNB School (2004); Le Corsaire for the Bavarian State Ballet (2007); Giselle with Marian Smith and Peter Boal for PNB (2011), and Paquita with Alexei Ratmansky and Marian Smith for the Bavarian State Ballet (2014). Doug’s writings on Stepanov notation have been published in Ballet Alert!, Ballet Review, Dance View, and Dancing Times. He has also presented numerous lecture-demonstrations about Stepanov notation on the Guggenheim Museum’s Works and Process series.

Marius Petipa

Marius Petipa (1818 – 1910) was a ballet dancer, teacher, and choreographer. Petipa is often given the title “Father of Classical Ballet,” and is cited nearly unanimously by the most noted artists of the classical ballet to be the most influential balletmaster and choreographer that has ever lived (among them—George Balanchine, who cited Petipa as his primary influence).

Petipa is equally noted for the ballets he created, some of which have survived to the present day in versions either faithful to, inspired by, or reconstructed from the original—The Pharaoh’s Daughter (1862); Don Quixote (1869); La Bayadère (1877); The Sleeping Beauty (1890); The Nutcracker (choreographed by Lev Ivanov, with Petipa’s counsel and instruction) (1892); Raymonda (1898).

Petipa also resurrected a substantial amount of works created by other choreographers which had long left the stage of other European theaters. By way of Petipa’s productions, many of these works lived on to the present day—Le Corsaire (1856, 1863, 1868, 1885, and 1899); Giselle (1850 with counsel and instruction from Jules Perrot, 1884, 1899); La Esmeralda (1866, 1872, 1886, and 1899); Coppelia (1884, 1894 with Enrico Cecchetti); Paul Taglioni’s La Fille Mal Gardée (1885 with Ivanov); The Little Humpbacked Horse (also known as The Tsar Maiden) (1895); and Swan Lake (1895 with Ivanov). There are a number of various divertissements and incidental Pas from Petipa’s original works and revivals that have survived in performance even when the full-length work did not, either in versions based on Petipa’s original or choreographed anew by others—the Grand Pas Classique, Pas de Trios, and Children’s Polonaise and Mazurka from Paquita (1881); the Venetian Carnival Grand Pas de Deux (also known as the Fascination Pas de Deux from Satanella) (1859/1870); The Talisman Pas de Deux (1889); the La Esmeralda Pas de Deux (1899); the Diane and Actéon Pas de Deux (1903/1931 in a version by Agrippina Vaganova); The Cavalry Halt Pas de Deux (1896); the Don Quixote Pas de Deux (1869); the La Fille Mal Gardée Pas de Deux (1885/1894); and the Harlequinade Pas de Deux (1900).

Paul Tazewell

Paul Tazewell has been designing costumes for theater, film and television, dance, and opera for more than 25 years. He received a Tony Award for best costume design for Hamilton, an Emmy Award for outstanding costume design for The Wiz Live!, and was nominated for an Academy Award for best costume design for the film West Side Story. Mr. Tazewell has also received Tony Award nominations for Bring in ‘Da Noise, Bring in ‘Da Funk, The Color Purple, In the Heights, Memphis, A Streetcar Named Desire, and Suffs. He designed costumes for PNB’s productions of Donald Byrd’s Seven Deadly Sins and Kent Stowell’s Swan Lake and most recently designed costumes for the film Wicked.

Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky

Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840-1893) studied at the Conservatory in St. Petersburg, where George Balanchine later studied piano in addition to his studies in dance. Tchaikovsky is one of the most popular and influential of all romantic composers. His work is expressive, melodic, and grand in scale, characterized by rich orchestrations. His output was prodigious and included chamber works, symphonies, concerti for various instruments, operas, and works for the piano. His works for the ballet include Swan Lake, Sleeping Beauty, and The Nutcracker, the latter two composed in close collaboration with choreographer Marius Petipa.

Balanchine had a special affinity for Tchaikovsky. “In everything that I did to Tchaikovsky’s music,” he told an interviewer, “I sensed his help. It wasn’t real conversation. But when I was working and saw that something was coming of it, I felt that it was Tchaikovsky who had helped me.”

Preston Singletary

Singletary’s art has become synonymous with the relationship between Tlingit culture and fine art. His glass sculptures deal with themes of Tlingit mythology and traditional designs, while also using music to shape his contemporary perspective of Native culture.

Singletary started blowing glass at the Glass Eye studios in Seattle, WA in 1982, where he grew up and continues to work and live. He developed his skills as a production glass maker and attended the Pilchuck Glass School. Singletary began working at the glass studio of Benjamin Moore, where he broadened his skills by assisting Dante Marioni, Richard Royal, Dan Dailey and Lino Tagliapietra. It was there where Singletary started to develop his own work. In 1993 he traveled for work to Sweden where he was influenced by Scandinavian design and met his future wife, Åsa Sandlund.

In 2000 Singletary received an honorary name from elder, Joe David (Nuu Chah Nulth) and in 2009 Singletary received an honorary doctorate degree from University of Puget Sound (Tacoma, WA). Forty years of glass making, creating music, and working together with elders has put him in a position of being a keeper of cultural knowledge, while forging new directions in new materials and concepts of Indigenous arts.

Now recognized internationally, Singletary’s works are included in the Museum of Fine Arts (Boston, MA), the Seattle Art Museum (Seattle, WA), the Ethnographic Museum (Stockholm, Sweden), The National Museum of Scotland (Edinburgh, UK) The British Museum (London, UK), The National Museum of The American Indian, Smithsonian Institution (Washington DC) as well as two solo exhibitions that toured multiple venues originating with the Museum of Glass (Tacoma, WA).

Reed Nakayama

Reed Nakayama is a Seattle-based Lighting and Projection Designer. He joined PNB in 2013 as a stagehand, and in 2019, was promoted to caretaker of the company’s copious designs. Here, he has illuminated stages in collaboration with artists such as Alexei Ratmansky (Wartime Elegy), Jessica Lang (Ghost Variations), Danielle Rowe (The Window), and Christopher Wheeldon (Curious Kingdom). He received a BFA in Performance Production from Cornish College of the Arts.

Wendall K. Harrington

Wendall K. Harrington has embraced many disciplines, including theater, publishing and multi-image/video design and production, and academia in her career. As a projection designer, her work has been seen in Broadway productions, opera, and dance. Ballet designs include work for Alexei Ratmansky, American Ballet Theater, Doug Varone and Dancers, San Francisco Ballet, and The Joffrey Ballet. Harrington lectures widely on the art of projection design and is the head of the MFA program in Projection Design at the Yale School of Drama. She was recently awarded a 2024 Tony Honors for Excellence in the Theatre.