In 1951 I saw a revival of Sauguet's ballet La Rencontre (1948), wherein the choreographer, David Lichine, poses the female Sphinx on a promontory some twelve feet above the stage. When Oedipus answers her question, she surges up in horrific despair, and as the curtain slowly falls she topple forward, to be caught by the ankles so that she dangles, inverted, swinging back and forth - the most spectacuar coup de théâtre I've ever witnessed.