Coppélia
(The full title is Coppélia, ou La Fille aux
Yeux d’Émail, which means The Girl with Enamel
Eyes)
In a village, in a place called Galicia, a toymaker
called Doctor Coppélius, makes a doll, which he names
Coppélia. Doctor Coppélius’s dream is
that one day Coppélia will come to life…
In Galicia there lives a girl called Swanilda, who is in
love with a boy called Franz. Swanilda is jealous of the mysterious
Coppélia who always sits in the upper window of Doctor
Coppélius’s house and suspects that Franz is
in love with her. To test out who Franz loves, Swanilda dances
with Franz with an ear of wheat. If the ear of wheat rustles
then he truly loves Swanilda, but if it remains silent then
he does not. To Swanilda’s dismay the wheat remains
silent. To forget their troubles, Swanilda and Franz dance
with their friends. During the dancing, Doctor Coppélius
drops the key to his house, which Swanilda and her friends
pick up. Swanilda and her friends enter Doctor Coppélius’s
house to find out who Coppélia really is.
Inside the house, Swanilda and her friends are amazed to
find out that Coppélia is actually a doll. As the friends
are playing with the dolls, Doctor Coppélius returns
and chases them away, all except for Swanilda who hides in
the same place that Coppélia is kept. As Swanilda is
hiding, Franz decides to climb through Coppélia’s
window to meet her. However, Doctor Coppélius catches
Franz and tricks him into taking a magic potion, which makes
him fall asleep. Doctor Coppélius is delighted as now
he can use Franz’s life-force to make Coppélia
come alive.
With
the help of an extraordinary machine, Doctor Coppélius
is delighted when Coppélia comes to life.
However,
Dr Coppélius does not realise that Swanilda has disguised
herself as Coppélia. As Swanilda is pretending to be
Coppélia, she becomes very mischievous and Doctor Coppélius
suspects that something is wrong. Swanilda realises that she
must leave Doctor Coppélius’s house and manages
to wake up Franz. The pair flee from the house but Doctor
Coppélius is left upset as he realises that his precious
Coppélia did not really come to life after all.