WHEN you’re talking about a ballet production of “Cinderella”, it doesn’t do to get too intellectual.

After all, as ballerina Yu Takayama, from the WA Ballet, points out to me, it’s essentially a romantic work.

And with words like “heartwarming”, “fairytale” and “enchanting” floating around, you can be sure the company will receive a warm welcome when it comes to town soon.

Choreographer Jayne Smeulders has choreographed a new classical-style ballet.

Using the haunting music of Prokofiev, Smeulders aimed to put the sparkle back into Cinderella’s glass shoes as was well as presenting young audiences with a story that personifies “purity and simplicity.”

As well, one-time head of design at NIDA, Allan Lees, has created fabulous new costumes and a restored set, re-imagined into the 1930s for a “family ballet classic”.

And in a happy local touch, Cinderella’s carriage attendants will be played by a Canberra kids, selected in the competition conducted by Canberra Theatre Centre.

This is Takayama’s second year with the WA Ballet and she has never been to Canberra before.

One of the artists who will perform Cinderella, she will alternate as the Fairy Godmother.

She studied with Tachibana Ballet School in Tokyo, later performing with the Asami Maki Ballet Company and Tokyo’s New National Theatre.

In 2002, she danced with the Zurich Ballet and in 2004 the Royal NZ Ballet.

One of the loveliest parts of the ballet to Takayama is the scene where three little birds dance, yet her main impression, over and above all the “beautiful, elegant, athletic” dance, is the humour.

Yes, those ugly stepsisters are centre stage and to her, they are “very, very funny”. So funny, I discover, that in the earliest version of the ballet, the critics described them as “more mad than bad.”

Puzzlingly, Smeulders has departed from innocence to explore the nasty old Grimm Brothers’ tale, much darker than the Charles Perrault version we were all brought up on.

“Cinderella”, Canberra Theatre, November 15-19. Bookings to 6275 2700 or canberratheatrecentre.com.au