Sleeping Beauty Wakes

Sleeping Beauty Wakes is a musical with book by Rachel Sheinkin, who won a Tony Award for The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, and a pop score^[1] by composer Brendan Milburn and lyricist Valerie Vigoda,^[2] two members of the indie music trio GrooveLily. The show is a twist on the classic Charles Perrault fairy tale of Sleeping Beauty.^[1] In this modern-day version, Rose is brought to a sleep-disorder clinic to wake her from her 900-year nap.

The musical was presented from March 31 to May 20, 2007 at the Kirk Douglas Theater of the Center Theatre Group^[3] in Los Angeles, California as a co-production with Deaf West Theater. It was directed and choreographed by Jeff Calhoun. In the spring of 2011, the McCarter Theatre in Princeton, New Jersey staged a revised version of the show directed by Rebecca Taichman, which removed all the Deaf elements.^[1][4] The version of the show also ran at the La Jolla Playhouse in San Diego, California in the summer of 2011, as a co-production with the McCarter.^[1][5]

The Center Theatre Group/Deaf West co-production received generally positive reviews and was ultimately honored with 10 Ovation Award nominations, winning in 2 categories.^[6]

In his review of the 2007 production in Variety, Bob Verini had only positive things to say about the performances, particularly singling out "Faye Dunaway look-alike Deanne Bray and superb singing partner Erika Amato," but felt that "it's the narrative that suffers from a split-personality disorder."^[7]

The Los Angeles Times review of the 2011 La Jolla production found Charles McNulty praising the show for "freely mix[ing] medical science with pixie dust" and said that "the inherent charm of the piece captivates our imagination even as the flaws peek through", but finally wrote that "the show's ambition [to be the next Wicked] seems to be pulling the work away from its strength as a musical comedy chamber piece. The enchantment is visible, but too much of it remains trapped in a glass case, like a waxwork Sleeping Beauty at a theme park."^[1]