What do you get when you mix the classic story of The Princess and the Pea with the flashy exaggerated showiness that is Broadway? Well, you get the hit musical Once Upon A Mattress. This story narrows in on Winnifred the Woebegone, “Princess of Icolmkill, Guardian of the Midgard Serpent and Warden of the Ragnorok Marsh Lily.” As you can tell by her name, she’s a very interesting princess, straight from the swamp. Winnifred, nicknamed “Fred” has been fetched by Sir Harry of the castle to become the bride of the kingdom mama’s boy Prince Dauntless the Drab. The kingdom has a Marriage Law that states: “Throughout the land no one may wed ‘til Dauntless to the altar’s led.” When Fred arrives at the castle, the temperamental Queen Aggravain refuses to accept her as a “genuine bonafide princess” and decides she must devise a plan to get rid of her. She and the wizard test her for sensitivity. Dauntless’s father, the king, literally has no say in this, since he is under a curse cast long ago that reads: “King Sextimus will never talk until the mouse devours the hawk.” Queen Aggravain places a pea under 20 soft downy mattresses, and tells the wizard that any true princess would feel it and be too uncomfortable to sleep. To ensure that Princess Winnifred fails the test, the Queen calls for a ball where everyone will dance the extremely tiring “Spanish Panic,” she summons a hypnotic mirror, a nightingale to sing a lullaby, and fixes her a warm glass of special milk. Will Fred pass the test? Will she be able to marry Prince Dauntless and lift the Marriage Law for the rest of the kingdom? Or will she fail like all the others and leave everyone in the kingdom sad with lost hope?
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