La Esmeralda (ballet)

La Esmeralda is a ballet in three acts and five scenes, inspired by the novel Notre-Dame de Paris by Victor Hugo, originally choreographed by Jules Perrot to music by Cesare Pugni, with sets by William Grieve and costumes by Mme. Copère.

It was first presented by the Ballet of her Majesty's Theatre, London on 9 March 1844, with Carlotta Grisi as Esmeralda, Jules Perrot as Gringoire, Arthur Saint-Leon as Phoebus, Adelaide Frassi as Fleur de Lys, and Antoine Louis Coulon as Quasimodo.

Today the complete ballet is performed only in Russia, Eastern Europe, and in New Jersey, United States, where the New Jersey Ballet introduced the full-length version for the first time in the United States in 2004. Most Western ballet companies only perform two Esmeralda-related pieces—La Esmeralda pas de deux and La Esmeralda pas de six—and the Diane and Actéon Pas de Deux, which is actually not excerpted from the ballet, but often mistakenly credited as having been added by Marius Petipa to his 1886 revival of La Esmeralda.

Plot outline based on the full synopsis translated by Professor Roland John Wiley:

The beautiful gypsy girl Esmeralda marries the poet Pierre Gringoire, to save him from death in the hands of the gypsy king. The groom is smitten with his new bride, but she makes it clear that the marriage is strictly one of convenience. Gringoire is not the only one infatuated with Esmeralda, the archdeacon of Notre Dame cathedral, Claude Frollo, is dangerously obsessed with the girl and orders his deformed henchman, Quasimodo, to abduct her. When Quasimodo attacks Esmeralda in the street, she is rescued by the King's Archers, led by their handsome captain Phoebus de Chateaupers, who capture Quasimodo. They plan to torture him, but Esmeralda asks for his release. The hunchback is deeply touched by her kindness. Phoebus is enchanted by the girl and gives her a scarf that was given to him by his fiancée, Fleur de Lys.

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