It started with a little mystery and fear. A man dressed in red and black concocting some weird evil potion.
“Is he the bad guy?” whispered Vera.
“Looks like it,” was my reply.
Then the scene changed to a time of joy and celebration - over the birth of a princess - Princess Aurora, whom we all know dearly as Sleeping Beauty.
So Vera and I enjoyed our mummy-daughter date to catch Sleeping Beauty on Ice.
Set to the magnificent music of Tchaikovsky, Sleeping Beauty on Ice tells the classic fairytale love story through sublime world class skating, breathtaking high speed lifts and throws, aerial gymnastics and fire effects – all on one ice-filled theatre stage.
In this rendition, instead of Sleeping Beauty pricking her finger on a spindle, she instead gets tricked into drinking a magical potion concocted by the mysterious man - an evil fairy.
I love the way the dark scenes are juxtaposed with the bright and happy scenes in King Stefan’s castle. They show the way light interacts with darkness, and how when darkness intrudes the space of light, something bad usually happens.
I also love the beautiful ice dance and acrobatic stunts. There is something about male and female figures ice-skating together in a beautiful dance of love and joy - that enthralls and captivates.
The minute they join hands and do a spin. Or when the female gets lifted up in the air by an invisible rope and gets swung in an elegant spiral by her partner.
It’s all rather beautiful and breath-taking.
Vera laughs and exclaims, “Mummy, they look like fans, spinning and spinning.”
The next minute, she asks, “Don’t they get dizzy? Turning and turning like that? And dragging the girls around?”
She laughs out loud at what she’s saying.
And I suppose that’s how a 6-year-old perceives a performance like this.
But the beauty of the ice dance and the drama unveiling before our eyes is not all lost on her.
She sits, smiling, bedazzled by the expert and precise body moves and footwork on stage. She also gets lifted by the aerial acrobatic performances.
“I wanna learn gymnastics too!” She gasps.
The choreography of the dances and acrobatic movement is indeed well-planned. From my seat, I sometimes grip my arm rest too tightly because it looks like someone is going to collide into another performer. But of course, nothing like that happens. Not with this award-winning troupe consisting of Olympic, World, European and National Championship level skaters.
The only glitch throughout the show was that the technical guys lifted one of the backdrop walls by mistake at one point. In another, I think one was wrongly dropped (only a tiny bit of the way down). But these were quite forgiveable, I mean it was opening night.
My favourite parts were the couple performances. I just love the chemistry between the partners and how they’ve practiced their moves and timing to perfection.
And of course…the beautiful ending. When love triumphs over evil, when light overcomes the night.
Sleeping Beauty on Ice is showing for only this weekend. Don’t miss this awesome performance! There are 4 more shows for you to catch at the MasterCard Theatres at Marina Bay Sands. Tickets, starting from $75, are available here.
26 Sep, Sat: 1:30pm & 7:30pm
27 Sep, Sun: 1:30pm & 6.30pm
We were sponsored a pair of tickets to watch Sleeping Beauty on Ice for the purpose of this review. All opinions are solely mine. Photographs by BASE Entertainment Asia.
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