Everyone wants to get into Margarita's bed. First there's her pet bear who cuddles up like a giant teddy, then there's the ugly frog who hops intrusively into her dreams and, finally, there's Corin, the witch's boy-turned-prince who's a better match than she can realise.
Although it's presented with all the innocence and fairytale sweetness you'd expect, Stuart Paterson's Sleeping Beauty is an unashamed study of awakening sexuality. It's all about who she shares her bed with. For Paterson, the act of sleep is a metaphor for the dark period of sexual hibernation before we emerge as independent adults. Margarita, aka Sleeping Beauty, played by Laura Donnelly with tremendous swagger, is an opinionated young woman who, having awoken from the witch's spell, comes to despise the provincial sleepiness of the aged adult world around her.
Reacting against it, she makes nightly journeys to the forbidden fruit of the dark side. Only an act of self-realisation can save her. Yes, of course she gets the boy in the end, but this is a feminist view of the old tale. Rather than a passive sleeper waiting for her prince to awaken her, this Sleeping Beauty is in control of her own destiny. Paterson keeps the sleeping to a minimum, works in the parallel story of the Princess and the Frog (fear of amphibians equals fear of sex) and extends the drama into a second-half battle of good and evil.
His 1996 script also works in themes about fatherhood, responsibility, freedom and desire, yet still finds room for the odd knockabout sequence and never loses its hold on a young audience. The same is true of Tony Cownie's production, which looks splendid on Gregory Smith's set of receding fur-lined archways framing two Ed Ruscha-style mountains. A special mention for Julie Austin as a wonderfully wry witch with an edge of camp and a haughty note of malice, making it all the more urgent that Margarita gets her wake-up call.
· Until December 31. Box office: 0131-248 4848.
