Cinderella (Fairytale)

"Cinderella", also known as "Cendrillon, ou La petite Pantoufle de Verre", is a fairytale featured on ABC's Once Upon a Time. It was written by Charles Perrault and incorporated in the book "Stories or Fairy Tales from Past Times with Morals" in 1697. A version was also written by German authors, The Brothers Grimm, in 1812.

Traditional Plot
Perrault's Version= A widower takes a haughty woman as his second wife. The woman and her two daughters, who are as vain and selfish as their mother, force the widower's daughter into servitude, making her work day and night.

Because she sleeps near the fireplace and finds herself covered in cinders when she wakes up, the stepfamily nicknames the daughter "Cinderella". As the years pass, Cinderella bears their abuse out of fear that her father might scold her if she told him about the extent of their mistreatment.

One day, the Prince invites all the eligible maidens to a ball, where he will select one of them to become his wife. The two stepsisters gleefully plan their wardrobes, all the while taunting Cinderella and telling her that maids were not invited.

As her family departs for the ball, Cinderella starts to cry only to watch as an elderly woman claiming to be her Fairy Godmother appears before her. Promising to get Cinderella to the ball, she transforms a pumpkin into a golden carriage, mice into horses, a rat into a coachman and lizards into footmen. The Fairy Godmother then proceeds to turn Cinderella's rags into a beautiful gown, complete with a delicate pair of glass slippers, and warn her that she must leave the ball before midnight, at which time all of the spells will be broken.

At the ball that evening, Cinderella entrances both the court and the Prince but heeds her Fairy Godmother's warning and leaves before midnight. She returns home where, later that night, listens to her stepsisters, who did not recognize her, talk about the girl who won the Prince's heart.

The next evening, the Prince hosts another ball and, with her Fairy Godmother's help, Cinderella attends. The Prince becomes even more enchanted with her and she even more enchanted with him that they lose track of time. As the clock strikes midnight, Cinderella flees and loses one of her glass slippers while making her way down the palace steps. The Prince, upon seeing the lone slipper, vows to find and marry the girl to whom it belongs.

The Prince tries the slipper on all the women in the kingdom to no avail. Upon arriving at Cinderella's home, the stepsisters try and fail to get the slipper on. Cinderella then asks if she can try and, after her foot fits the slipper, produces the other slipper, which she has kept. She then forgives her stepfamily and later marries the Prince while her stepsisters marry two gentlemen belonging to the Prince's court. The ailing wife of a wealthy gentleman tells their daughter to remain good and kind for the rest of her days. The wife dies sometime later and the daughter grieves at her grave every day. The following year, the gentleman takes a woman with two daughters of her own as his second wife.
 * -|Grimm's Version=

The stepfamily makes the daughter dress in rags and give her the nickname "Aschenputtel". Despite being mistreated and forced to do all the housework, Aschenputtel follows her mother's wishes and prays her circumstances will improve.

One day, before departing for a fair, the gentleman asks his daughters what they would like him to bring back. The stepsisters ask for dresses and jewelry while Aschenputtel asks for the first twig to knock his hat off. The gentleman returns from the fair with a hazel twig, which Aschenputtel plants at her mother's grave and waters with her tears until it grows into a hazel tree.

As time slowly passes, Aschenputtel prays under the hazel tree three times a day. tells a white bird what she wishes for and watches as the bird throws down what she wished for.

Several years later, the King decrees that a three-day festival will be held and invites all the maidens in the land so that the Prince can choose a wife. Aschenputtel asks her stepmother if she can go with her family only to be cruelly rebuffed. When she insists, the stepmother empties a dish of lentils into the ashes and says she can go if she can pick them up in two hours' time.

Aschenputtel, with the help of a flock of doves that comes to her aid, accomplishes the task in less than an hour only for her stepmother to redouble the task with even more lentils. When the girl once again accomplishes the task in less than two hours, the stepmother, determined to not spoil her daughters' chances of becoming the Prince's bride, refuses to let Aschenputtel go the festival and leaves with the rest of her family.

Aschenputtel goes to the hazel tree and, after asking to be clothed in silver and gold, receives a gold and silver gown with silk shoes from the dove. She goes to the castle and captivates the Prince, who spends the first day dancing with her. Towards sunset, Aschenputtel asks to leave and the Prince escorts her home only for her to elude him and hide in the pigeon coop. The Prince asks her father to chop the coop down, which he does only to learn that the coop is empty.

The next day, Aschenputtel returns to the festival in even grander apparel. She spends the entire second day dancing with the Price and, towards sunset, eludes him when he tries to escort her home by climbing a pear tree. The Prince asks her father to chop the tree down, which he does only to learn there was no one in the tree.

On the third and final day, Aschenputtel returns to the festival in a beautiful dress and gold slippers. She spends the entire day dancing with the Prince but loses track of time and, while leaving the castle, loses one of her gold slippers. The Prince, upon retrieving the forgotten object, vows to marry the maiden whose foot fits the slipper.

The following morning, the Prince visits Aschenputtel's home and presents the slipper to the stepsisters. The eldest, acting on advice from her mother, cuts off her big toe and fools him into thinking the slipper fits. When they start making their way back to the castle, however, the dove confronts the Prince and tells him there is blood dripping from the shoe.

The Prince brings her back home and asks the younger sister to try the slipper on. She, acting on advice from her mother, shoves her heel in until it starts to bleed. The younger sister fools the Prince and rides with him to the castle only to be brought home when the dove exposes her treachery.

The Prince then asks if there is another girl living in the house, to which the gentleman responds by telling him they keep a maid but omitting to mention that she is his birth daughter. Aschenputtel then appears and, after her foot fits the slipper, goes with the Prince, who recognizes her as the girl he danced with at the festival.

Show Adaptation
First Iteration=

First Iteration
Second Iteration=
 * Cinderella's real name is Ella.
 * The sorcerer Rumplestiltskin kills the Fairy Godmother before she can grant Cinderella's wish to go to the ball and replaces the Fairy Godmother's role in this aspect.
 * One of the stepsisters is actually in love with the Prince's Footman and plans to run away with him only to be thwarted after Cinderella tells her stepmother where they are.

Second Iteration

 * Cinderella's real name is Ella.
 * Cinderella attends the ball with plans to kill the Prince. When she is unable to do it, her stepmother stabs him and frames Cinderella for the crime.
 * One of the stepsisters is killed in an unknown manner that Cinderella blames herself for. The other is a magician and later casts the Dark Curse to exact revenge against her mother.
 * -|Other=

Other

 * A stepsister becomes the Red Queen of Wonderland, but she is not related to Cinderella, and instead has a stepsister of her own with a parallel story to Cinderella.
 * An excerpt from the Charles Perrault version of the fairytale can be seen in Henry's storybook in "The Snow Queen".

Episodes Featured

 * The Price of Gold"
 * "The Other Shoe"
 * "Hyperion Heights"
 * "The Garden of Forking Paths"
 * "Wake Up Call"
 * "Pretty in Blue