1965
Notre-Dame de Paris
Related to Live Entertainment and Cinema
Ballet first presented on December 11, 1965 at the Palais Garnier.
Choregrapher: Roland Petit
Costumes: Yves Saint Laurent
Set Design: René Allio
Music: Maurice Jarre
When Roland Petit and I were working on Notre-Dame de Paris, we never dreamed that this ballet would still be performed at the Opéra de Paris thirty years later. It was a success as soon as it was created, and today it is a classic, at once in terms of modernity, invention, and imagination. I wanted the costumes to have the same colors as the cathedral’s stained glass windows, and I drew on Mondrian for Phoebus’s costume. I tried to reflect the timeless youthfulness of the choreography. I was inspired by the courtroom judges, the shady movements of the Court of Miracles, Frollo’s distress, Quasimodo’s moving tenderness, like a fresco from the Middle Ages.
Yves Saint Laurent, September 1996.
