Story by Jennah Stewart, Photos by Mason Gross
On Tuesday, December 8, I saw the Eleanor Drury Children’s Theatre presentation of Cinderell@ at the Thunder Bay Community Auditorium. Cinderell@ is a modernized version of the story of the classic fairytale.
The play starts with a slide show projecting above the stage showing the back story of the character Cinderella—the daughter of a fashion outlet owner who had died and who’s evil wife took over the store. Along with her horrible wanna-be fashionista daughters she forces Cinderella to work tirelessly making clothes for the store and for them. Cinderella’s only friends are the six mice she had transformed from worst to best dressed. She does this by making them clothes using bits of cloth from clothes she had already made and show her amazing up-cycling skills to the world on her video-blog “Trendy and Friendly.”
After the slideshow portion, Prince Charming enters the stage. He is sending out invitations to his big party at the palace. Cinderella’s step-mother and step-sisters are ecstatic hoping that one of the sisters will attract the Prince’s attention, but Cinderella is disappointed because she has an enormous list of chores her step-mother gave her to do, never mind the fact she has absolutely nothing to wear which may stop her from going to the party!
Luckily, the Fashion Godmother comes to the rescue! The Fashion Godmother is a world famous fashion icon who has even been on The Ellen DeGeneres Show! Fashion Godmother gives Cinderella a super cute outfit and, of course, the gorgeous silver shoes! Finally, at the party Cinderella catches the prince’s eye and dances the night away after everyone, even the mice, dance to “Watch Me!”
But, as midnight strikes Cinderella runs away leaving behind a single silver shoe. That night the prince not only sends out the shoe to be tried on by every girl in kingdom, but sends out a request on social media to everyone to help him find the mystery girl. Eventually with the help of everyone on social media, Cinderella is found and the shoe is brought to her house to try on and it fit! The prince and Cinderella meet and live happily ever after!
This was a great play and a super fun twist on an old fairy tale that made for a fun evening and received a standing ovation from the entire audience! It was full of all your favourite characters and a few new ones who sung, danced, laughed and showed just what kids in our community can do! Well done!
