| Princess Aurora | |
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| First appearance | Sleeping Beauty (1959) |
| Created by | Brothers Grimm |
| Voiced by | Mary Costa (original film) Erin Torpey (speaking, sequels/merchandise) Cassidy Ladden (singing, sequels) Christie Houser (singing, studio) |
| Aliases | Briar Rose |
Princess Aurora is a fictional character and a major character from Disney's 1959 animated film Sleeping Beauty, as well as an official Disney Princess. She is also known as "Briar Rose".[1]
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Profile
Personality
Aurora is portrayed as a kind, playful, shy, gentle, and a fairly naive girl, who loves animals. Her most prominent personality trait is her passion for love and is seen as hopeless romantic.[1] The good fairies of the kingdom have blessed her with beauty and the gift of song. She is lonely most of the film, as she is isolated to a cottage in the woods.[1]
An enjoyer of the simple things in life, Aurora often wonders why her aunts treat her like a child and wishes to meet new people, see new places and make her own decisions.
But still, seeing as she's young and naive about the world around her, she feels her aunts know what's best for her and is very obedient towards them. For example, she runs away from Prince Phillip when she realizes she's talking to a stranger, something the fairies told her not to do. Also when she is under Maleficent's spell and is about to touch the spindle, she hesitates when she hears the fairies tell her not to touch anything, only to be overwhelmed by Maleficent's power.
She's very selfless and only thinks of what others want of her, instead of what she wants for herself, seeing as she agrees to go back to her palace home thinking that she'll never see her true love again.
In Disney Princess Enchanted Tales: Follow Your Dreams, Aurora is shown to have matured since the first film. She is protrayed as very responsible, hard working, self assured, courteous, confident and strong minded. She's less dependent on her aunts and is finally able to do things her way and make her own decisions. She also comes to believe that perseverance, hard work and sticking to something all the way through makes everything better in the long run.
Wardrobe
While Aurora is secluded at the woodcutter's cottage as Briar Rose, she wears a simple peasant frock with a black headband. Then the three fairies make her a ball gown for her introduction as a princess, but two of the fairies bicker over it being blue or pink. Throughout the second half of the film, Aurora's dress switches between blue or pink as the fairies zap it with their wands. However, Disney's official Sleeping Beauty costume is pink for both women and girls, so Flora has won the argument.[2][3] In Disney Princess Enchanted Tales: Follow Your Dreams, she wears a powder blue nightgown with a matching headband and transforms it into a golden ball gown to go with the jewelry as a dress rehearsal to the banquet.
Development
The original character design of Aurora was done by Tom Oreb, who modeled the princess after the elegant, slender features of actress Audrey Hepburn. Aurora's lead animator, Marc Davis worked with Oreb to sharpen her features and clothes so that they would blend with the backgrounds' angular shapes.[1]
As done with other Disney films, Walt Disney hired an actress to perform live-action scenes as a reference for the animation process. Actress Helene Stanley performed the live-action reference for Princess Aurora. She did the same kind of work for the characters of Cinderella and Anita in One Hundred and One Dalmatians.[4]
According to Christopher Finch, author of The Art of Walt Disney:
| “ | Disney insisted that all scenes involving human characters should be shot first in live-action to determine that they would work before the expensive business of animation was permitted to start. The animators did not like this way of working, feeling it detracted from their ability to create character. [...] [The animators] understood the necessity for this approach and in retrospect acknowledged that Disney had handled things with considerable subtlety.[5] | ” |
Appearances
Sleeping Beauty
Princess Aurora was born from King Stefan and his wife, Queen Leah. At her christening, she was given gifts by 2 of the 3 fairies that showed up. Following this, the bad fairy named Maleficent showed up, angry at not being invited, and put a curse on Aurora stating that at the age of 16, she would prick her finger on the spindle from the spinning wheel and die. Luckily the third good fairy, named Merryweather, had not presented a gift yet and is able to change the curse to sleep instead of death. Concerned the three good fairies take Aurora to a secluded cottage in the wood and change her name to Briar Rose. When Aurora grows to be a teenager, she is daydreaming in the forest when she meets a handsome man who happened to hear her singing. Briar Rose does not realize he is Prince Phillip, and they agree to meet again that evening. Meanwhile the three good fairies are preparing for her birthday and to surprise her with the news that she is a princess. But when Briar Rose returns with the news of meeting a strange but enchanting man, the fairies must tell her she can never see him again. The three fairies tell her about the future that is set for her and that night they take her back to the castle. Aurora is saddened that she will never see the man from the forest and asks to be left alone. The three fairies oblige. Aurora suddenly sees a floating spark of light cast by Maleficent and, in a trance, follows the spark to a spinning wheel. All the three good fairies try to stop her, but Maleficent's spell is too strong and Aurora touches the spindle, pricking her finger. She has been put in a bed by the fairies where she can sleep peacefully. To prevent further hurt in the kingdom, the fairies put the whole kingdom to sleep. They discover that Prince Phillip is the man in the forest and he's walking in to a trap, and they help him confront Maleficent. After Prince Phillip fights and seemingly kills Maleficent, who transformed into a dragon, he moves upstairs to Aurora's bedroom and kisses her; she wakes up from the spell and smiles. They dance at the celebration announcing her betrothal.
Disney Princess Enchanted Tales: Follow Your Dreams
In the beginning of the movie, Princess Aurora introduces herself. This is very important, since little can be known about Aurora's personality from the film . After she asks a question, she guides the viewer to the scene where she is told by her father, King Stefan and her mother, the queen, that being a princess is so easy. Then after both her parents and Prince Phillip leave, she has some duties to do when as a princess. During the "Keys To The Kingdom" musical number, she orders her servants to cook food, plant tulips, lilies, and orange trees, cut topiary, and paint the trellis pink. She has been taken to the table in a chair where she can wait for her guests to come for the party. Later on, the clumsy Duke helps her sign the forms and reviews what she has found. There is a speech invitation King Hubert has forgotten to take. She instantly sends it to the three good fairies and is told by Merryweather that she has to use her wand for magic. When she uses it to make the brown cows appear, one of them headbutts the Duke. She then manages to sell cows to the farmer who meets her and the other peasants who wait for too long. After Prince Phillip, King Hubert, her parents and the good fairies return, they all attend a banquet together and after they enjoy it even with a big drumstick dropping on the table in front of the kings, she talks about how she enjoyed her own duties, thanks you for watching her story and gives you a goodbye wave.
Kingdom Hearts Series
Princess Aurora (新六蘭・六ズ Arōra Rozu) is one of the Disney Princesses of Heart who appears in the Kingdom Hearts series. She is presented as a princess who came from the same world as Maleficent, the Enchanted Dominion. Aurora is set to appear in the game prequel "Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep."
Kilala Princess
Princess Aurora also appears in the Japanese fantasy/romance manga, Kilala Princess. It is produced by Kōdansha that debuted in Nakayoshi in April 2005, which revolves around a sweet young girl named Kilala and the stubborn Prince Rei as they try to find Kilala's kidnapped friend with the help of the six Disney Princesses, who are, of course, Aurora along with Snow White, Cinderella, Ariel, Belle, and Jasmine.
Disney Theme Parks
Princess Aurora is often seen in the theme parks as a meetable character. She usually wears her pink ball gown with a tiara.
Attractions
The iconic castle in Disneyland is called the Sleeping Beauty Castle. There is also a Sleeping Beauty castle in Hong Kong Disneyland and in Disneyland Paris, called Le Château de la Belle au Bois Dormant. Park visitors are able to walk through the castle and view several dioramas depicting scenes from the Disney film Sleeping Beauty. The original dioramas were designed in the style of Eyvind Earle, production designer for the film.
References
- ^ a b c d "Sleeping Beauty Character History". Disney Archives. http://disney.go.com/vault/archives/characters/sleeping/sleeping.html.
- ^ "Sleeping Beauty Girl's Costume, acquired May 8, 2009". Disney Store. http://www.disneystore.com/disney/store/DSIProductDisplay?storeId=10051&productId=1245256&categoryId=57493&catalogFromSearch=10002&catalogId=10002&langId=-1.
- ^ "Sleeping Beauty Adult Costume, acquired May 8, 2009". Disney Store. http://www.disneystore.com/adult-costumes-sleeping-beauty-costume-for-women/p/1234371/13812/?CMP=KNC-DSSYahooPI.
- ^ "Cinderella Character History". Disney Archives. http://disney.go.com/vault/archives/characters/cinderella/cinderella.html.
- ^ "Walt's Masterworks: Cinderella". Disney Archives. http://disney.go.com/disneyatoz/familymuseum/collection/masterworks/cinderella/index.html.
External links
- Princess Aurora at Disney's Archives
- Official Disney Princess site
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