Making up alternate endings to great ballets, -- a topic for the silly season? Options

[bart]

In La Fille mal gardee Lise and Colas and up eloping to Vegas where they are married by an Elvis lookalike.

Hey, Charming_Lise, it could WORK!

The stylized and caricatured 18th-century farm yard is, in some ways, just as unreal as 21st-century Las Vegas.

Wouldn't you have to add music to allow for the transition through time and space? How, exactly, might the "elopement" be staged, I wonder? What are they escaping from? Do you imagine the other characters pursuing them, or do they leave -- and arrive -- alone?
______________________

Here's another ending that I've often thought about. At the end of Pas de Quatre, the 4 tres-spirituelles ballerinas pose frozen in their iconic concluding tableau. Silence. The audience, of course, begins to applaud. But no one moves. The applause begins to taper off. The audience is uncomfortable.

At that point, the flower boy emerges from the wings. He walks towards the 4 ballerinas. From behind his huge bouquet, he withdraws -- one after another -- 4 custard pies. He plants each firmly, almost sacramentally, on a ballerinas' face. They remain in pose. He performs a courtly bow to the ladies and departs, stage right. Curtain.

[JMcN]

Over the years I have seen performances, in various productions, of Romeo and Juliet where I cannot understand why Juliet has not run off with Paris before the end of the ballroom scene!!

Or in Onegin, Tatiana runs off with him at the end instead of collapsing in grief?

[dirac]

Good point, JMcN. Maybe Paris shouldn't be too appealing...

[carbro]

Good looks are one thing, chemistry (IMG:http://ballettalk.invisionzone.com/style_emoticons/default/wub.gif) is another.

I've always wanted to see an R&J (insofar as I've wanted to see any) with a less than gorgeous Juliet and Romeo. It suggests that there is more than a superficial attraction between them.

[JMcN]

Alternative ending for Raymonda: J de B is a wimp and Abderam is fun so Raymonda jilts J de B and runs off to live happily ever after with Abderam! (Thus shortening a three hour ballet to 2 hours!).

[bart]

Alternative ending for Raymonda: J de B is a wimp and Abderam is fun so Raymonda jilts J de B and runs off to live happily ever after with Abderam! (Thus shortening a three hour ballet to 2 hours!).

An added bonus to this ending: their mixed marriage is so stunning and so RIGHT that it ends the religious/political violence in the Middle East. The wedding is celebrated as a truly multi-cultural gathering and a renunciation of ancient animosities. The curtain falls on a tableau-apotheosis to Peace and Tolerance. (IMG:http://ballettalk.invisionzone.com/style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[volcanohunter]

Not so much an alternate ending as a post scriptum. Quite unable to decide which one of them gets to arrange the parties at Aurora's and Désiré's, Cattalabutte and Gallison launch a television show on which they compete head-to-head organizing fabulous soirees, picnics, hunting excursions and gala balls, with a jury of fairy tale characters deciding the winner.

Seriously, every time I see The Sleeping Beauty I wonder how those two will ever get along.