«Why Sleeping Beauty?» asks the Carlo Colla & Figli Puppetry Company, which returns to the Piccolo for its traditional Christmas performance. «For the desire for tales, the tales that lie within us, where space and time cease to exist, where Good and Evil are clear and defined, not fluctuating and impenetrable, as they are in real life. Where harmony alone triumphs. And for the desire to create a visual celebration of a literary genre created for adults and then unjustly transformed over time into an aspect of childhood». 
The tale by Charles Perrault – here translated masterfully by Carlo Collodi and recomposed with the structure of the famous ballet by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, from which the play takes its music – is a poetic nod to the intrigue that characterised the court of Louis XIV. This plotting was the inspiration for the curse cast by Desolation on the infant Aurora.
The mysterious prophecy that seals off space and halts time is countered by the fairy Harmony who enchants and lulls the little Sylphs and the members of the court. The arrival of prince Desire rekindles the sense of chivalry; with the creatures summoned by the evil Desolation defeated, the prince rushes to complete his heroic endeavour, awakening the princess and the inhabitants of the castle from the deep slumber into which they had fallen.

Recommended for audiences over the age of 4