February Fairy Tales - The month in which I compare and contrast various classic fairy tales to their modern counterparts.
This tale is fairly modern and therefore what you see is pretty what you get. But there are some pretty dang funny renditions. Once Upon a Mattress is a play based on the tale, and is entirely satirical in nature. The princess, Winnifred, comes on stage by climbing over a brick wall, spewing water all over the stage, and belting a song about how shy she is. And at the end, we discover there isn't even a pea - the servants went in and stuck a bunch of jousting equipment under the mattresses before Winnifred even went into the room.
My other favorite rendition comes from Gail Carson Levine's Princess Tales. Rather than having a princess come in and fall in love with the prince and pass the 'pea test,' she simply has the prince fall in love with a commoner and then when her housekeeper tries to kill her off, she ends up at the palace and pretends to be a princess. She passes several tests because she is so picky and so sensitive to everything (the reason her housekeeper keeps trying to off her). So in a sense, that version is rather ironic as well.
I must say, however, that my favorite version is from Faerie Tale Theatre. For those of you who have not discovered this excellent mini-series, I highly recommend renting it sometime. The prince (Tom Conti) is totally quirky, the princess (Liza Minelli) is hilarious, and the fact that some tourists end up breaking the glass of the pea display at the end makes the thing ridiculously funny.
And that, in a peashell, is the princess and the pea. :-)
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2 comments:
Wait, isn't Liza Minelli the princess in Faerie Tale Theatre's version? But yes, I love that one. But then, I really like Faerie Tale Theatre in general.
You're right! The website I was looking at to extract the name was totally wrong. And yes, Faerie Tale Theatre is amazing! :-)
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