Mouse-free Cinderella

On Thursday night we took our daughter "L" on a "special surprise" we had been building up all week. Stacy and I and honorary Grandma Flo took L to see a full stage production of Cinderella at the South Bay Civic Light Opera. Now lest I immediately be mocked and ridiculed for being grossly "inconsistent" in my disdain for all things Disney, let me quickly note that this was the Rodgers & Hammerstein musical, and not at all a Disney-goes-to-Broadway torturefest. Not a freakish humanoid mouse in sight!

While I had heard that R&H had done a version of Cinderella (broadcast on live television back in the 50's starting Julie Andrews), I wasn't familiar with any of the music. The storyline more or less followed the Disney version rather than the bloodier Grimm fairytale plotline. (Yes, bloodier. If you haven't read the Brothers Grimm story, put it on the top of your reading list. It's quite a trip. Lots of mayhem and mutilations. Fun fun!)

L surprised me. While she was obviously excited and thrilled to go, her excitement took on a serenity I wasn't expecting. We were braced for the three-year-old, princess-induced, spaz-out, but got more of a stunned wide-eyed wonder. We were in the front row of the second section, so there was a short railing in front of us rather than seats. For a good deal of the play she simply stood in front of her chair at the railing (which came up to her chin) in her poofy satin dress, transfixed on the stage, swaying slightly to the music. Even toward the end when she needed to lie down in Daddy's lap, her eyes never wandered, and she never got distracted. Stacy and I'd run through all the potential disaster-prevention contingency plans long before we got there (whispered threats of suffocation, mid-aria haulings-off to the lobby, etc.), and were quite pleased that no one had to be strangled or brought up on charges by child protective services.