Sleeping Beauty (1959)

Date: [unknown] [unknown]
Location: [unknown]

SLEEPING BEAUTY

This sub-project is part of the larger Classic Disney Project. Please visit the main project page for details on the goals and objectives of this project.

CAST

• Mary Costa, Princess Aurora (Living) (c)
• Bill Shirley, Prince Phillip
• Bill Thompson, King Hubert (c)
• Taylor Holmes, King Stefan (c)
• Verna Felton, Flora / The Queen (c)
• Barbara Jo Allen, Fauna
• Barbara Luddy, Maryweather (c)
• Eleanor Audley, Maleficent
• Bobby Amsberry, Maleficent's Goon
• Candy Candido, Maleficent's Goon
• Pinto Colvig, Maleficent's Goon (c)
• Dallas McKennon, Owl / Diablo the Raven (c)
• Hans Conried, Royal Herald
• Marvin Miller, Narrator (c)

(c) = Connected

Film Facts

Plot: After the long-awaited birth of their daughter, King Stefan and Queen Leah proclaim a holiday and announce that Princess Aurora is betrothed to Prince Phillip, the son of King Stefan's best friend, King Hubert, thus uniting the two kingdoms. But having been snubbed from the festivities, the evil fairy, Maleficent, the young princess, announcing that she will die by pricking her finger on the spindle of a spinning wheel before sunset on her 16th birthday. Fortunately, the good fairy Merryweather is able to change the spell so that Aurora instead falls into a deep sleep instead. Now, the only way to wake her from her sleep will be a true love's kiss.

- The film was a hybrid story based on both Charles Perrault's Sleeping Beauty (1696) and the Grimm Brothers' Little Briar Rose (1812). Other written versions of the Sleeping Beauty tale can actually be traced back to the 1330s.

- Sleeping Beauty was Disney's 16th full-length animated feature film. It was released across the United States on 29 Jan 1956. Work on the film had actually begun back in 1951, but had been delayed for numerous reasons, including Walt's own disinterest in the project, as he became increasingly involved with the development of his California theme park.

- Sleeping Beauty was the last Disney animated film to feature traditionally inked cels. Later films would employ then cutting-edge Xerox technology to make cels, which was a somewhat less painterly process but allowed for the animators’ line drawings to actually make their way onto the big screen.

- Sleeping Beauty was a box office disappointment. In fact, it was such a financial loss for the studio that Disney waited thirty years before producing another fairy tale feature for the big screen: The Little Mermaid (1989).

- Sleeping Beauty did garner an Academy Award nomination or Best Scoring of a Musical for composer George Burns, who based the film's score on Peter Tchaikovsky's Sleeping Beauty Ballet.