NARRATOR: Once upon a time, in a beautiful castle,
lived a king and a queen who were very happy,
as a baby princess had just been born to them.
She was so beautiful that they decided to call her just Beauty.
The king decided to hold a great feast and to invite all the fairies of his kingdom.
The king wrote to all the 13 fairies in his kingdom
and the queen counted the golden dishes they would eat from.
To their dismay, they found there were only 12 dishes.
One fairy must be left out.
Next day, the king's page carried the invitations
to all the fairies of the kingdom, except one.
They were all delighted to hear of the birth of the princess
and said they would come to the feast.
At the feast, the fairies gave all their best gifts to the little princess.;
Virtue, beauty, riches,
a voice for singing, lips for kissing and feet for dancing,
all that was good and right for a baby princess to have.
But a small, black messenger flew to the thirteenth fairy
who had not been invited to the feast, and told her what was going on.
The thirteenth fairy was a wicked fairy and was very angry.
(FAIRY CACKLING)
This is my gift for Beauty.
Fifteen years she will live with your gifts,
but on her fifteenth birthday, she will prick
her finger with a spindle and will die.
(FAIRY CACKLING)
The king and queen were heartbroken at the wicked fairy's spell
and all the fairies were dismayed.
But the rose fairy, who had not yet given her gift,
used her power to alter the spell.
If the princess pricked her finger, she would not die but fall asleep,
and would be wakened by a kiss after a hundred years.
To try to prevent the spell,
the king ordered that all the spindles in his kingdom should be destroyed.
Everywhere, housewives brought out their spindles
and the king's men carried them away.
And time passed. It was the princess's fifteenth birthday.
Wandering in the garden, Beauty came upon a strange, high tower
and looking up, she saw an old woman beckoning to her.
It was really the wicked fairy.
She was spinning.
The princess had never seen a spindle before and she asked if she could try it.
And she pricked her finger and the spell began to work
and she fell into a deep sleep.
(FAIRY CACKLING)
The king and queen fell asleep and the page fell asleep, too.
The servants fell asleep and the knight in the courtyard and his groom fell asleep.
The dogs fell asleep and the horses in their
stables and the soldiers at the gate.
And in the kitchen, the fire stopped blazing and went to sleep
and the scullery maid dropped the fowl she was plucking.
And the cook, who was just catching the
kitchen boy stealing tarts, dropped his ladle
and they all fell asleep.
And so everything stood still.
And thorns grew up round the palace and surrounded it, and the years passed.
And in the world outside, children were born
and grew up and had children of their own
but everything in the castle slept.
A hundred years passed.
And then one day, a king's son came into this land and saw the castle
and wondered what it might be.
And an old shepherd told him of the legend of the castle,
which had fallen under a spell of sleep.
And of the beautiful young princess who had slept for a hundred years.
And the surrounding hedge of thorns,
which for a century no one had been able to penetrate.
The prince spurred forward, eager to see the marvel.
At his approach, the thorns fell away, for the hundred years of the spell had passed.
The princess fell in love with the prince
and slowly the spell of sleep unwound from the castle.
And all the court were filled with wonder
at the strange thing which had befallen them
and at the handsome young prince who had come to awake Beauty from her sleep.
And the prince married Beauty and they lived in the castle
and the thorns disappeared forever