THE SLEEPING BEAUTY

Nobel Prize-winning author Elfriede Jelinek reinvents this classic story with the help of acclaimed experimental Russian director Yana Ross in a dark and humorous production of the festival circuit. In Jelinek’s version of this timeless fairytale, an apocalyptic battle of the sexes ensues. Locked up in an orthopedic corset and strapped to metal and glass for a hundred years, the Princess is as fragile as a Ndebele doll. Soon after the Prince rips off her surgical armor, she learns to walk again, and the two become embroiled in a bitter and macabre struggle for power in a work that deftly explores our illusions’ of sexuality, of power, and of being itself. Sleeping Beauty workshopped at the Yale Cabaret and premiered at the Seoul Performing Arts Festival (Korea) in Fall 2008 in a Beth Morrison Projects world-premiere.

Produced by Beth Morrison Projects at the Seoul Performing Arts Festival in 2008.

Sleeping Beauty is a play that explores our illusions—of sexuality, of power, of being itself—in an unconventional and occasionally disturbing way.
The Yale Herald

Creative Team

TRANSLATOR — GITA HONEGGER
DIRECTOR — YANA ROSS
PLAYWRIGHT — ELFRIEDE JELINEK
PRODUCTION DESIGN — ZANE PIHLSTROM
FEATURING — MIKE FLOYD & HAYLI HENDERSON