Lady Tremaine

: “Cinderella will be put in her place.”
: ―Lady Tremaine[src]
: Lady Tremaine (also commonly known as the "Wicked Stepmother" or "Evil Stepmother") is the main antagonist of Disney's 1950 animated feature film, Cinderella. As the cold-hearted stepmother of Cinderella, Lady Tremaine does not harm her stepdaughter physically. Rather, she seeks to punish and abuse her psychologically, motivated by her jealousy of Cinderella being far more beautiful than her own awkward daughters, Anastasia and Drizella (although her abuse later extends towards them). Lady Tremaine was also a socialite, determined to gain higher status by marrying one of her daughters to Prince Charming or another bachelor of noble or royal blood.
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== Contents ==
* 1Background
** 1.1Development
** 1.2Personality
** 1.3Physical appearance
* 2Appearances
** 2.1Cinderella
** 2.2Cinderella II: Dreams Come True
** 2.3Cinderella III: A Twist in Time
** 2.4Cameos
* 3Live-action appearances
** 3.1Once Upon a Time
*** 3.1.1First Iteration
*** 3.1.2Second Iteration
** 3.2Cinderella (2015)
** 3.3Descendants 3
* 4Printed media
** 4.1Descendants: Isle of the Lost
** 4.2So This is Love (A Twisted Tale)
** 4.3Cold Hearted
* 5Video games
** 5.1Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep
* 6Disney Parks
** 6.1Walt Disney World
** 6.2Tokyo Disney Resort
** 6.3Hong Kong Disneyland
** 6.4Disney Cruise Line
* 7Gallery
* 8Trivia
* 9See also
* 10External links
== Background ==
=== Development ===
: “The villain-victim relationship was one of the very best we had on any feature... Lady Tremaine was the only villain to live beside her victim day by day”
: ―Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston
Lady Tremaine was voiced by Eleanor Audley, who also provided live-action reference for the character. She was animated by Frank Thomas.
Thomas commented that Lady Tremaine was the driving force throughout the film and that she had to be believable, even though she was far from human, to be considered a serious threat to the realistically animated Cinderella. The fights between Lucifer and the mice could be seen to reflect the (much less physical) conflict between their human counterparts, Lady Tremaine and Cinderella.
Like all the character animators for Cinderella (excluding Ward Kimball, who animated Lucifer and the Mice), Thomas used live-action footage as a reference when drawing the frames of animation. Eleanor Audley, dressed as Lady Tremaine, was filmed performing every action the character was required to make; the individual frames from this footage were then placed under animation paper. The actions were not traced exactly but used as guidelines.
Whenever the photostats were followed too closely or a piece of human action was directly copied, the results seemed to the animators to lose the 'illusion of life'. Therefore, the live-action reference was used primarily to suggest to the animator movements and mannerisms; he may not have thought of otherwise. These were then applied to the animated character within their context. Thomas praised Audley's cold, regal performance, the inspiration for his animation of the character.
=== Personality ===
: “Cold, cruel, and bitterly jealous of Cinderella's charm and beauty, she was grimly determined to forward the interests of her own two awkward daughters.”
: ―Opening narration[src]
Unlike most other Disney Villains, Lady Tremaine doesn't possess any magical powers (until she finds Fairy Godmother's wand in A Twist in Time) or exert any physical force. She strongly believes in maintaining grace and self-control, reminding her daughters of this when the two fight during their music lesson. The only time she herself breaks this rule is, ironically, at the point when Cinderella interrupts the music lesson to bring Lady Tremaine the invitation to the royal ball (at which point she frustratingly slams her hands onto the keys of the piano). She has a sinister glare and is very cruel to Cinderella; an example is when she silences her harshly twice when ordering Cinderella to do chores in the château. She even does the same to Anastasia and Drizella occasionally, implying that she's not much better towards towards her two biological daughters than she is towards Cinderella.
Lady Tremaine holds great envy towards her stepdaughter simply for her beauty and wholesome charm, so she treats her stepdaughter like a servant in her own home. A tyrant who employs subtle methods, she is deviously manipulative in controlling Cinderella by maintaining a sham benevolence in her household authority; she never physically abuses Cinderella and instead encourages her daughters to do so, while Lady Tremaine herself opts for verbal and emotional abuse. For example, when she slyly noted that Cinderella fixed up her dress with the help of Drizella's beads and Anastasia's sash, her daughters took the initiative to rip Cinderella's dress to shreds. Lady Tremaine also makes sure she never has to keep her promises, especially those she makes to Cinderella since she wants to make sure Cinderella is never happy, while simultaneously remaining true to her words. This is done when she falsely promises Cinderella that she can attend the ball if she can find something suitable to wear, and once she manipulates her daughters into tearing up their stepsister's dress, Cinderella is reduced to rags, leaving her unable to attend the ball. Her stepmother then cruelly bids Cinderella "good night", ultimately maintaining her ostensible 'fairness' in her side of the bargain.
By Cinderella III: A Twist in Time, however, Lady Tremaine's personality and overall aura took a darker turn, as she herself was implied to have become much more openly abusive towards her two biological daughters, specifically towards Anastasia, when Drizella briefly suggested she and Lady Tremaine beat Anastasia with a stick the latter had found. Her newfound violent nature was unleashed during the climax when she tried to turn both Cinderella and Anastasia into toads when the latter refused to marry Prince Charming, having already turned some of the guards into animals, and would most likely have done the same to the King had she succeeded, as her aim to gain access to the palace may have also been fueled by a lust for power.
Almost all of Tremaine's actions are motivated by a selfish hunger for prestige, and possibly even a lust for power and domination, as she wants to marry her daughters off to those on the top of the social ladder, most likely as a means of gaining access to the Palace. Tremaine expects her daughters to be utterly obedient and is infuriated when they are not, as seen when Drizella almost divulged their plan, and more notably when Anastasia chose not to marry Prince Charming out of love.
In the Kingdom Hearts games, she is also shown to be quite reckless when she doesn't get her way, as evidenced by her summoning an Unversed to kill Cinderella and Aqua; apparently, neither being aware nor even caring if the Unversed in question harms her or her daughters in the crossfire.
=== Physical appearance ===
Lady Tremaine appears to have aged well, with sharp facial features, including a notably large, hooked nose with pronounced creases on both sides. She has gray hair (brown in her youth) worn in a high heart-shaped pompadour, with a small lighter gray streak in the middle. Her green eyes are fierce and evil-looking when she is either angered or harboring evil thoughts, and her green orb-shaped earrings contrast her eye color. Her casual and most commonly seen set of clothes consists of a large crimson gown with a golden brooch near her neck that has a green gem in it, and the gown has a high purple collar with extended purple sleeves (She wears a purple version of this outfit in the third film). She wears a large green ring on her right ring finger that matches her earrings and brooch, and in the finale, certain close-ups show her nails are painted a lavender hue to compliment her sleeves. When sleeping, she wears a long-sleeved blue nightgown with a light blue collar and a pink hairstrap with azure straps. Her formal attire (which she wears to the ball) is a long purple gown with short sleeves. She usually carries an ebony cane with an inlaid stone, more for aesthetics than physical support.
In the live-action re-imagining of the original film, despite being the mother of two fully-grown daughters, Lady Tremaine is a beautiful and elegant woman with red hair and blue eyes and is much younger in age than her animated counterpart. She is always fashionably dressed; for example, for the royal ball, she wore a gown made of emerald green taffeta with gold inserts, a pair of gold satin gloves, and her hair was embellished with three golden feathers.
== Appearances ==
=== Cinderella ===
Lady Tremaine is introduced in the prologue of the film. Young Cinderella's father, a widower, desperate for his daughter to have a mother figure, married Lady Tremaine, who is described as "a woman of good family", with two daughters, Anastasia and Drizella, of her own, and a cat named Lucifer. Lady Tremaine shows her true colors when Cinderella's father dies, mistreating Cinderella while spending extravagantly on Anastasia and Drizella in hopes of molding them in her own image, but also spoiling them as a result.
After the prologue, it is revealed that Cinderella has become a coerced servant in her own home and lives in a small room at the top of the tower in her house. An incident occurs in which Anastasia finds a mouse inside her teacup (Lucifer deliberately caused this to happen when he chased Gus). Lady Tremaine responds by piling a further order of chores on Cinderella as punishment, silencing her harshly (twice) when she attempts to object. She then, as a sense of poetic justice on Lucifer, adds onto the pile the request to give the cat a bath.
Later that day, during Lady Tremaine and her daughters' music lesson, Cinderella interrupts when she brings them an invitation to a ball at the palace that night. Lady Tremaine consents that Cinderella may attend the ball - that is, if she can finish all her chores and find a suitable dress. However, she actually has no intention of letting Cinderella go, so she proceeds to heap chore after chore on her stepdaughter for the rest of the day.
That night, when Cinderella appears ready for the ball in a suitable dress (her mother's, altered to be more fashionable by her mice and bird friends), Lady Tremaine indirectly (but intentionally) points out that Cinderella is wearing Drizella's old beads and Anastasia's old sash that they threw away earlier in the day. This prompts Drizella and Anastasia to viciously tear Cinderella's dress apart, leaving her unable to attend the ball. When Cinderella, with the help of the Fairy Godmother, nevertheless attends the ball, her stepfamily does not recognize her. This is because of a combination of their belief that Cinderella was at home with her dress in tatters, the fact that Cinderella's new dress was in a different style from her old one, and the fact she was made up so very differently to her usual appearance. Another possible reason could be that the Fairy Godmother's magic prevented them from recognizing her (as revealed in the live-action film). Lady Tremaine does note a familiarity about her as she dances with Prince Charming close to her. She is not, however, permitted to study Cinderella long enough to make the connection, as the Grand Duke closes the curtains to give them privacy.
At the news that the Prince will marry the girl whose foot fits in the glass slipper left behind at the ball, Cinderella becomes quite distracted and falls into a dreamlike state, dancing and singing "So This is Love" to herself. It is through this that Lady Tremaine finally realizes Cinderella was the mysterious girl who danced with the Prince at the Ball. She quietly follows Cinderella up the tower and locks her in her room, putting the key in her pocket.
As the Grand Duke then arrives with the glass slipper, Lady Tremaine instructs her daughters not to fail her. She watches as both Anastasia and Drizella try their hardest to force their enormous feet into the slipper. While this is happening (the stepsisters prolong the process with their repeated attempts to get the slipper to fit their feet), Cinderella's two mice friends, Jaq and Gus, steal the key from Lady Tremaine's pocket and bring it to the door of Cinderella's room. The mice succeed in freeing Cinderella from her room despite Lucifer's delaying them. When Cinderella appears and calls to the Duke, Lady Tremaine insists to the Duke that Cinderella may not have attended the ball as she has been a household servant, despite having deduced that she has. The Duke orders Lady Tremaine to step aside. However, Lady Tremaine trips the herald as he walks over to Cinderella, in one underhanded, last-ditch attempt to shatter her hopes, causing the slipper to fall off its cushion and shatter into pieces. Cinderella then reveals that she has the other slipper, and her stepmother watches in horror when it fits her foot.
=== Cinderella II: Dreams Come True ===
Lady Tremaine made her second film appearance in the Direct-to-DVD sequel Cinderella II: Dreams Come True. In this film, she only appeared in the "An Uncommon Romance" segment. Lady Tremaine is shown to be cold towards her own biological daughters, implying she hasn't treated them much better than she treated Cinderella. When Anastasia falls for a common baker, Tremaine harshly forbids her to do so much as speak to him again or even enter his bakery again. (As before, Lady Tremaine's ambitions reflect her aristocratic narcissism, for she still wants her daughters to choose wealthy noblemen as husbands.) Thus, Anastasia must defy her mother's wishes for the first time, and the segment ends with her attending Cinderella's ball with the baker boy she presumably will soon marry.
=== Cinderella III: A Twist in Time ===
Her most significant role to date has been in the second direct-to-video Cinderella sequel, Cinderella III: A Twist in Time. Unlike in the first two films, she is far more evil and physically abusive towards not only Cinderella, but also her two biological daughters (particularly Anastasia).
This time, Lady Tremaine acquires the Fairy Godmother's magic wand after Anastasia finds it. Intent on ruining Cinderella's happy ending and stealing it for her own daughter to gain access to an opulent lifestyle in the palace, Tremaine uses the wand to reverse time and undo Cinderella's "happily ever after" (turning Cinderella back into her virtual slave). She also enchants the glass slipper to fit Anastasia, so that Cinderella never gets to try on the slipper herself, going so far as to deliberately break the other glass slipper Cinderella has in her possession.
She then uses the wand to enchant Prince Charming into forgetting Cinderella and marrying Anastasia instead, making him believe that Anastasia was the girl whom the Prince danced at the ball the other day instead of Cinderella. After having Cinderella banished, Drizella almost divulges the plan by saying that the Tremaine family has 'won', which prompts her mother to warn her to remain silent unless she wishes to join Cinderella. This is another notable example of Lady Tremaine's cruelty having become much more indiscriminate.
When Charming discovers the truth, Tremaine makes her most notable—and horrific—use of the Fairy Godmother's wand by transforming Anastasia into the mirror image of Cinderella, then teleporting the genuine Cinderella into a pumpkin (that becomes a nightmarish travesty of the original coach from the first film) to be killed off by Lucifer, which she uses the wand to transform him into a human coachman. Fortunately, Cinderella manages to escape and returns to the wedding.
Ultimately, Anastasia is her mother's undoing; she comes to feel reluctant to marry somebody under false pretenses; the Prince does not love her, nor does she truly love him, and she cannot bear to live the rest of her life pretending to be something she is not (even if it means finally possessing beauty). Cinderella arrives back at the Palace, just in time to witness, to her amazement, and to Tremaine's fury, Anastasia saying, "I...don't". Angered by both Cinderella's interference and Anastasia's sudden conscience, Lady Tremaine and Drizella emerge from their hiding place, now intent on getting revenge on both of them for their defiance.
Angrily, the King orders some of his guards to arrest Lady Tremaine, who defends herself by turning the guards into various animals — the guards coming at her from the front turn into chickens, the guards coming from the right turn into pigs, and the guards from the left turn into rabbits, so that they cannot arrest her. Tremaine then tries to turn Anastasia into a toad until Cinderella steps in to protect her, not willing to let Lady Tremaine harm Anastasia for trying to fix her happy ending. An unfazed Lady Tremaine decides to turn them both into toads, but the Prince intervenes and reflects the magic beam with his sword, and it hits herself and Drizella instead. Anastasia then restores herself to normal before giving the magic wand to Cinderella so that she can undo all the wrongs that her stepmother has committed.
During the end credits, Lady Tremaine and Drizella have been restored to their human forms but are wearing scullery clothes identical to those Cinderella used to wear, implying that they will be forced to work as servants under the King's authority as a punishment for their cruelty towards Cinderella and Anastasia.
=== Cameos ===
Lady Tremaine was given a few cameos with her daughters and Lucifer in House of Mouse. In the episode "Pete's House of Villains", she makes Pete (who is dressed like Cinderella when the former was Tremaine' slave) clean the floors as punishment for attempting to take over the club. Other cameos include her sitting alongside the Evil Queen.
Lady Tremaine makes a cameo in the Who Framed Roger Rabbit Special Edition DVD on one of the menus but does not appear in the film itself. She can be seen pushing Baby Herman's buggy as he smokes a cigar. Considering that the film takes place in 1947 and Cinderella debuted 3 years later, her absence would make sense.
An emoticon version of Lady Tremaine also appeared in the Cinderella entry of the As Told by Emoji short series.
== Live-action appearances ==
=== Once Upon a Time ===
Two different, yet unrelated versions of Lady Tremaine appear in the ABC fantasy drama series.
==== First Iteration ====
Lady Tremaine appears in a cameo only in the Season 1 episode "The Price of Gold", portrayed by Jan Brandle Smith, as inhabitants of the Enchanted Forest. A carriage is seen parked on the outside of her private property, and she, with her daughters, make their way toward it, wearing evening gowns. Lady Tremaine enters the chariot first, followed by her two daughters. Soon afterward, we are treated to the sight of her stepdaughter, Ella, dressed in rather unfair rags. The poor blonde looks with sadness at her stepfamily as they leave their property on the carriage, headed to the prince's ball. After the curse thrown by the Evil Queen, it was explained that Lady Tremaine lives plausibly (it was not the case) with her daughters in Storybrooke and has cut any ties with Cinderella.
Lady Tremaine returned and was properly featured, in the Season 6 episode "The Other Shoe", portrayed by Lisa Banes. In addition to being cruel to Ella, she is equally cruel to one of her daughters, Clorinda, when she finds out the latter is planning to run away with the prince's footman, instead of a more noble man to the Land of Untold Stories. Ella tries to stop her from killing the footman, but when she sees Ella's engagement ring from the prince, she grabs the key to open the portal to the aforementioned realm taking Clorinda with her.
She is sent to Storybrooke along with her daughter and with the help of the Evil Queen testing her own nemesis Emma Swan, they lure Ella into a trap. But Ella reveals that Clorinda's lost love is in Storybrooke, and Lady Tremaine tries to kill him and her daughter, only to have Ella step in front of the lovers. She takes her walking stick and fatally stabs Ella, but then Emma Swan uses her magic to heal Ella thus ruining the woman's plan.
She is eventually arrested and forced to do community service, which involved picking up trash around town.
==== Second Iteration ====
Another version of Lady Tremaine, portrayed by Gabrielle Anwar, made her debut in the Season 7 premiere episode, "Hyperion Heights". She is the primary antagonist of the first half of the seventh season, along with Drizella and Mother Gothel, who have teamed up against her. Here, she is also Rapunzel.
Marrying Marcus, Rapunzel gains two daughters. One night, Marcus falls ill and in the brink of death, Rapunzel is forced to make a deal with Mother Gothel, resulting in her imprisonment in a tower. Six years later, Rapunzel escapes and reunites with her family, but finds that Marcus had married Cecelia and has a stepdaughter. As she struggled to adapt, Mother Gothel offers her a curse, which she uses on Cecelia, tearing her from Marcus. After Anastasia ends up on the brink of death, she seeks Mother Gothel's help and imprisons her afterward. She then kills Marcus and makes Ella the maid of the manor, shielding off her past by being known to all as Lady Tremaine with plans to awaken Anastasia.
While Cinderella's Fairy Godmother sleeps, Lady Tremaine shackles her wrists and steals her wand. Later, after the Fairy Godmother wakes up, Lady Tremaine explains that she stole the wand as a teaching moment for her daughter Drizella. She tells Drizella never to rely on magic, as magic is not power since it can be taken. Lady Tremaine then turns the Fairy Godmother to dust. At the royal ball, Lady Tremaine sneaks up behind the prince, and kills him, after Cinderella fails to do so. She tells Cinderella that the Prince rejected Drizella, then promptly frames Cinderella for the prince's murder. She watches as Cinderella and Henry Mills fight off the prince's guards and Cinderella escapes the castle. Lady Tremaine and some of the palace guards then track down Henry in the forest, and take him to her home, imprisoning him in Cinderella's old room. She gives instructions to Drizella to kill Henry. The next morning, as Lady Tremaine discovers Henry's abandoned shackles, Wish Realm Hook visits her, saying that he can help get rid of Henry if she helps him in return. He asks her to make him look like the other version of himself so that Emma Swan will fall in love with him. Tremaine agrees to help him, and with the help of Fairy Godmother's wand, transforms him into a spitting image of the other Hook.
She initially tried to use Henry's and Drizella's heart to awake her daughter but failed to do so. Upon the birth of Lucy, Lady Tremaine gives a drop of her blood to the heroes in order to use blood magic to turn Drizella to stone, which lasts for eight years before she is freed by Gothel. After the Dark Curse is cast by Regina upon Gothel and Drizella poisoning a captured Henry to make her cast it, Lady Tremaine is sent to the Land Without Magic.
After a new curse is cast, Lady Tremaine lives in Hyperion Heights, a new fairy tale town located in Seattle. Due to the curse, she is known as Victoria Belfrey, an urban developer who plans to buy up the lands and buildings of the neighborhood to develop them, as a gimmick to bring in more people from outside of Hyperion Heights. She also managed to retain her memories as Lady Tremaine, remembering her life in the Magical Forest, though she is also given fake memories by Drizella to make her think that she cast the curse. Her daughter, Drizella, known as Ivy Belfry in Hyperion Heights, works as her assistant. Victoria wants to take custody of her step-granddaughter, Lucy, so when Lucy runs away from home to find her father, Henry, Victoria decides that Jacinda is no longer capable of taking care of her and removes Lucy into her home. She enlists the help of Detective Weaver and Detective Rodgers to dig up evidence on Henry to try and get him away from her family, as she feels he is a nuisance. After they come up with nothing, Victoria gives the detectives one of her bracelets to plant on Henry and frame him for theft. At Lucy's ballet recital, as Victoria is about to close the performance, she is interrupted by Weaver and plays along with thinking her bracelet was stolen. She is then shocked when Henry is confronted, and instead of revealing her bracelet, reveals his keys. She is unaware that Rodgers never actually planted the bracelet on Henry.
Victoria hopes to strip Lucy's power of being the truest believer in order to revive her daughter Anastasia and is holding a witch as a prisoner at Belfrey Towers to force her into carrying out her plan against her will. Victoria later hires Ralph to burn down Mr. Cluck's Chicken Shack to destroy Jacinda and Sabine's chances at becoming successful at selling Sabine's popular beignets. Victoria is later arrested for kidnapping Eloise Gardener by Detective Rogers. Through a deal, Detective Rogers helps her locate the Once Upon a Time book, which she uses to tell Lucy about her past to retrieve Lucy's lack of believe's tear. Successful in it, Victoria uses it and awakens Anastasia. Unfortunately, Weaver tells her that by reviving Anastasia there are consequences, as she can be able to revive Lucy after being convinced that she is the Guardian, but Gothel thwarted those plans, eventually taking Victoria prisoner as payback. Ivy later finds Victoria at the bottom of the well when Ivy is double-crossed by Gothel. Victoria then escapes with Ivy's help and decides to use a resurrection amulet to wake Lucy up. Working with Gothel, Victoria learns that the resurrection requires a life, which Gothel plans to use Ivy. Victoria sacrifices herself in order to save Ivy, doing so successfully wakes Lucy. Victoria is later buried in Hyperion Heights cemetery, and Ivy finishes what she started by successfully rescuing Anastasia from Gothel.
In Once Upon a Time in Wonderland, Anastasia's mother, portrayed by Sarah-Jane Redmond, is also very similar to Lady Tremaine in her personality.
=== Cinderella (2015) ===
In the live-action re-imagining of the original film, Lady Tremaine is played by Cate Blanchett.
Beautiful, elegant, stylish, and red-haired like her daughters, Lady Tremaine was described by the narrator to be "a woman of keen feeling and refined taste". She was once married to Sir Francis Tremaine, the Master of the Mercer's Guild, and according to her, he was the "light of her life." After he died, her second marriage to Ella's father had been for the sake of her daughters.
In the beginning, Lady Tremaine did not seem to bear any particular animosity towards her stepdaughter, Ella. She instead focused on restoring life and laughter to the estate, which had been somewhat silent after Ella's mother died. Her attempts at such appeared to be hosting elaborate parties to which even the nobility was invited, where fine wines flowed and were consumed in excess, and everyone gambled.
However, during one such party, when she went to fetch her husband, she overheard a private conversation between him and Ella. It was then that her jealousy and spite towards Ella was incited, for the conversation confirmed that her husband loved Ella more than he did her, and he still dearly cherished the memory of his late wife (Ella's biological mother) - all of which made her feel that she was not only living in Ella's mother's shadow but was also overshadowed by Ella herself.
After he departed on a trip, Lady Tremaine gradually revealed her true passive-aggressive nature. The first instance was to indirectly make Ella give her bedroom to Drisella and Anastasia and move into the attic - though she did state that it was a temporary measure since she was having the other rooms redecorated. She also took subtle advantage of Ella's kindness by making her work like a servant to distract her whenever her daughters displayed embarrassing behavior, such as pretending to accidentally upset a plate of biscuits when Ella grimaced at Drisella's abysmal musical performance.
When the news of her husband's death came, Lady Tremaine was again visibly upset that his dying words had only been of Ella and her mother, and even his dying memorial had solely been for Ella. Her daughters inquired about their lack of promised gifts, but she snapped at them by stating that it did not matter, for they were all ruined, and lamented about how they were to live.
Due to financial pressures, she dismissed the entire staff of servants. She also had no further qualms about being open about how she truly felt towards her stepdaughter: as described by the narrator, Ella grew to be ever misused by her step-family, who increasingly viewed her as more of a servant than a relation. Lady Tremaine's transparent excuse for making Ella take on all the household chores was that it distracted her from her grief, and she, Drisella, and Anastasia were more than happy to provide her with a very great deal of such distraction. She later joined in her daughters' mocking of Ella as "Cinderella" when she woke up covered with soot and even forbade her from sitting at the table to share a meal with them.
When the royal ball was announced, Lady Tremaine refused to buy a new gown for Ella and even accused her of being too ambitious to even think she could attend the ball. Enraged when Ella appeared anyway in an old dress of her mother's, she ripped one of the sleeves and encouraged her daughters to rip the dress apart.
Later that night, Lady Tremaine is as surprised as everyone else when a beautiful but mysterious princess in a blue gown steals Kit's heart. Despite her attempts to have her daughters turn Kit's head away from the mysterious princess, they were unsuccessful, and she later inadvertently learns that the Grand Duke had already promised Kit's hand in marriage to the Princess Chelina of Zaragoza. This leads to her believing that her schemes to marry one of her daughters to Kit would come to nothing, given that the ball was - in her own opinion - a mere diversion.
However, after the ball, her suspicions of the mysterious princess's true identity were aroused by Ella's attitude. Later on, she discovered a glass slipper hidden in the attic, which in turn led to her first - and final - heart-to-heart confrontation with her stepdaughter. She starts off by confessing that her second marriage to Ella's father had been for her daughters, but she was still unbearably jealous of how beloved Ella was to him, and now it seemed she would live unhappily ever after since Kit was in love with Ella, effectively ruining her plans to marry one of her own daughters to him. She then proposes a deal that, in her own words, will benefit all parties: after Ella and Kit were married, Ella will make her the head of the royal household, they would ensure that Drisella and Anastasia marry wealthy husbands, and she will manage Kit.
Ella rejects this out of hand, telling her that she will not let Kit and the kingdom fall into her stepmother's clutches after failing to protect her father. An enraged Lady Tremaine shatters the slipper in response to her defiance. Shocked and grieved beyond endurance by this, Ella demands to know the true reason for her stepmother's cruelty to her, to which Lady Tremaine replies that Ella is everything that she was not: young, innocent, and good. She locks Ella in the attic.
Lady Tremaine then went to meet the Grand Duke, whom she blackmails into making her a countess and ensuring worthy husbands for her daughters in exchange for keeping the secret so Kit would have to marry Princess Chelina.
When the captain found Ella hidden in the attic, Lady Tremaine initially declared that she would not allow Ella to try on the slipper as her mother. Ella curtly responds that she is not and never will be her mother. Though she was increasingly afraid and angry at this turn of events, all Lady Tremaine could do was grip Ella's arm as she passed her by and quietly warned her to remember who she was.
However, as Ella leaves the château with Kit, she shoots a long, meaningful stare at her stepmother on the stairwell and finally tells her that she forgives her. At this, Lady Tremaine sinks to the ground in defeat. The Tremaines later left the kingdom with the Grand Duke, never to return.
=== Descendants 3 ===
Lady Tremaine makes an appearance in the third film of the Descendants franchise, and is played by Linda Ko. She appears twice in the film, the first time she is shown seeing off her granddaughter Dizzy, as she is leaving for Auradon. It is revealed that she cares greatly for her granddaughter.
The second time is during the finale when the barrier separating Auradon and the Isle of the Lost is permanently brought down, and she is reunited with Dizzy.
It is revealed in Descendants 2 that she owns a salon on the Isle called Lady Tremaine's Curl Up and Dye.
== Printed media ==
In one of the Disney Reading Series, Lady Tremaine and her daughters visit Cinderella and her husband at his castle. She keeps up the pretense that she no longer harbors any ill will towards Cinderella but is later shocked when her daughters inform her that Cinderella is apparently planning to supplant them with "special people" (unaware that Drizella and Anastasia were the special people she was referring to) and plotted alongside them to sabotage Cinderella's efforts.
=== Descendants: Isle of the Lost ===
Lady Tremaine is one of the villains imprisoned on the Isle of the Lost. She is the teacher of Evil Schemes and Nasty Plots at Dragon Hall. She is the grandmother to Dizzy and Anthony Tremaine (offsprings of Anastasia and Drizella).
=== So This is Love (A Twisted Tale) ===
Compared to her film role, Lady Tremaine serves a smaller role as a secondary antagonist (the main antagonist being the Grand Duke).
=== Cold Hearted ===
Tremaine acts as the protagonist in the eighth Disney Villains novel which shows the circumstances of her first meeting with Cinderella's father and how they eventually came to be married, along with her cruelty extending to Anastasia and Drizella in Cinderella's absence.
== Video games ==
=== Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep ===
In Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep, Lady Tremaine's role is identical to that of her film role. Treating Cinderella as a mere servant and showing no love towards her, the wicked stepmother does all in her power to see that her daughters are successful in life. She is upset by their constant sibling rivalry, also showing an extreme affection for her devious cat named Lucifer, despite the animal's cruelty to Cinderella's mouse friends.
After discovering the identity of the maiden that had won Prince Charming's heart at the royal ball to be none other than Cinderella, Lady Tremaine immediately locked her in her room when it came time for Anastasia and Drizella to try on a single glass slipper that had been left behind when the girl fled. Enraged when Cinderella was let out of her room by Jaq and the slipper fit her, Lady Tremaine used the jealousy in her heart to turn Cinderella's pumpkin carriage into an Unversed, the Cursed Coach, in an attempt to eliminate Cinderella and Aqua. Her scheme backfired when one of the firebombs the Cursed Coach produced landed on her and her daughters, presumably killing them.
== Disney Parks ==
Lady Tremaine occasionally appears in the Disney theme parks as a meetable character. She is known to be considerably vain and sarcastic to the visiting guest(s), just like how she treated Cinderella and her daughters in the film.
=== Walt Disney World ===
In Hocus Pocus Villain Spelltacular at the Magic Kingdom, Lady Tremaine is the last of the villains Maleficent conjures as one of the "frightful friends" to help the Sanderson Sisters with their Halloween celebration. Tremaine and the others join the sisters in singing "I Put a Spell on You" in the show's finale.
She can also be found in the Magic Kingdom for meet-and-greets and is fairly common during the seasonal events occurring in the park, specifically during Halloween alongside other Disney villains.
=== Tokyo Disney Resort ===
A picture of her was shown in the attraction Cinderella Castle Mystery Tour.
=== Hong Kong Disneyland ===
Lady Tremaine can be seen ominously walking down a staircase during the final scene of The Nightmare Experiment. She also made an appearance during the finale montage of Villains Night Out!
=== Disney Cruise Line ===
Lady Tremaine makes an appearance on Twice Charmed, a show on the Disney Cruise Line. Lady Tremaine grows a deeper hatred for Cinderella as the days go by and soon enough she gains her very own Fairy Godfather, a male counterpart of Fairy Godmother. Unlike Cinderella's magical friend, Tremaine's godfather is an evil and dark magician-like man. She uses his magic to reverse time to take control of the King's kingdom!
== Gallery ==
The Disney Wiki has a collection of images and media related to Lady Tremaine.
== Trivia ==
* An early design sketch of Madame Leota for the Haunted Mansion attraction shows a striking resemblance to Lady Tremaine, featuring the same facial structure and exact hairstyle of a Victorian hair bun. This is most likely due to the fact that Eleanor Audley also provided the audio recording for Madame Leota as well.
* In the 2015 movie, she is a noble, which is the reason Cinderella's father married her in the first place.
* Lady Tremaine was nominated for a place in 'AFI's 50 Greatest Villains list', along with the Evil Queen, Stromboli, Man, Maleficent, Cruella De Vil, and Ursula.
* In the original French story, the stepmother receives only a very minor mention in the beginning; it is the stepsisters who are noted throughout the rest of the story.
* Lady Tremaine's name is only mentioned once in the film, during the ball: when Anastasia and Drizella are getting ready to meet the prince, the court announcer says, "The Mademoiselles Anastasia and Drizella Tremaine, daughters of Lady Tremaine". This is the only time that her name is referenced in the original film or the animated film trilogy. All other times, Lady Tremaine is addressed only as "Mother" by her daughters, "Stepmother" by Cinderella, and "Madam" by the Grand Duke. Her name is mentioned much more frequently in the 2015 film.
* In the opening of the 1950 film, Lady Tremaine is depicted with brown hair in her younger years, a trait which Drizella's brunette hair color somewhat resembles.
* Eleanor Audley, who was the voice of Lady Tremaine in the original 1950 film, also voiced Maleficent in Sleeping Beauty. It can be easily perceived because the two villains had similar mannerisms and voice tones. In fact, her performance as Lady Tremaine was partly the reason why she was given the role. Similarly, her succeeding voice actress (Susan Blakeslee) also voices Maleficent.
* The Into the Woods official website at one point implied that Lady Tremaine would be the Wicked Stepmother role in the live-action adaptation. However, this was later revealed to be an error, and Disney confirmed the characters would not be.
* In the original film and Dreams Come True, her dress is crimson. In A Twist in Time, her dress is purple, implying that she had more than one dress in her wardrobe.
* Tremaine is a Cornish surname, as well as a village and civil parish in Cornwall. This might suggest her family is of Cornish descent.
* Lady Tremaine's eyes briefly turn yellow when she locks Cinderella in her room, clearly showing how far on the path of evil she has gone.
* Destroying the glass slipper before Cinderella could try it on could be considered an act of treason since she was also trying to prevent the prince from getting married.
* Lady Tremaine is one of only three main antagonists in the Disney animated canon to be a biological parent, being mother to her daughters, Anastasia and Drizella, with the others being Robert Callaghan (father to Abigail) and King Runeard (father to Prince Agnarr). However, while Lady Tremaine and Runeard have no love for their respective children and only see them as pawns to their images and ranks in society, Robert genuinely loves and cares about Abigail (and his belief of losing her is what temporarily turns him into a villain). Lady Tremaine is also the only one of these three antagonists whose children are also bad (though nowhere near as evil as she is), since Abigail and Agnarr are good people, unlike their respective fathers.
== See also ==
* Cinderella's Stepmother
== External links ==
* Lady Tremaine on Wikipedia
* Lady Tremaine on Villains Wiki
* Lady Tremaine on Villains Wiki
* Lady Tremaine on Kingdom Hearts Wiki
* Lady Tremaine on Once Upon a Time Wiki
* Rapunzel Tremaine on Once Upon a Time Wiki
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