CINDERELLA DAILY

Cinderella (2015) Dir. Kenneth Branagh

I am Cinderella. Your Majesty, I’m no princess.

Perhaps it was just as well that Ella’s stepsisters were cruel. For had she not run to the forest, she might never have met the prince.

At first, Sandy Powell wasn’t convinced that Cinderella’s (James) dress should be blue like her cartoon counterpart’s. “I wasn’t given any instruction by Disney on whether or [not] I should l use it, pay homage to it, or discard it,” Powell told Us Weekly. “I knew we were making a modern-day version—a new version, a live-action version—so I decided to ignore it.” After considering the ideas of a pink, white, and yellow dress, the designer landed back on blue “because it’s actually the prettiest color and really flattering,” she shared. To create the princess dress’ exact shade of cornflower blue, the Academy Award-winning designer layered panels upon panels of tulle in a rainbow of colors, giving the blue a shimmer effect when James moved. Another fun fact: The dress’ petticoat is so large, it boasts four miles of thread! (x)

You can’t be.

Oh, sing sweet nightingale

Your Highness. If I may, that is, it would give me the greatest pleasure, if you would do me the honor of letting me lead you through this– the first… Dance?

And yet, through it all, Cinderella remained ever gentle and kind, for with each dawn she found new hope that someday, her dreams of happiness would come true.

‘When the two sisters returned from the ball Cinderella asked them if they had been well entertained, and if the fine lady had been there. They told her, yes, but that she hurried away immediately when it struck twelve, and with so much haste that she dropped one of her little glass slippers, the prettiest in the world, which the king’s son had picked up; that he had done nothing but look at her all the time at the ball, and that most certainly he was very much in love with the beautiful person who owned the glass slipper’.

Concept art Cinderella (1950, Disney) by Mary Blair

Once upon a time, there was a girl called Ella. And she saw the world not always as it was, but as perhaps it could be, with just a little bit of magic.

Now, off you go. For you shall go to the ball!

“A dream is a wish your heart makes when you’re fast asleep. In dreams you will lose your heartaches. Whatever you wish for, you keep. Have faith in your dreams, and someday, your rainbow will come smiling through. No matter how your heart is grieving, if you keep on believing, the dream that you wish will come true.”

I’m only a girl, not a princess.

Just because it’s what’s done, doesn’t mean it’s what’s should be done. Or something like that.