Cinderella Circumstances - Television Tropes & Idioms

Rather unfortunate indeed.

Similar to Riches to Rags, this trope may come into play when a rich child's single parent marries someone secretly cruel/mean who acts sweet and nice around the father and two-faced/terrible around their new child. If the stepparent has children of their own, expect the children to have a similar personality; the child may lose their parents or be abandoned by them and sent to a Orphanage Of Fear. Worst still, the poor child may have been born into such circumstances where she is forced to work for her keep.

In other words, the formerly well to do child, is reduced to a lower state in life, (they may be put into the position of a servant for their new stepmother and stepsisters) or they were not that well to do to begin with.

Examples:

Anime/Manga

Candy Candy: At age 12, Candy is "adopted" by the Leagan family to be a companion to Eliza and later ends up as a maid. The children, Eliza and Neal, tease her and order her about, and their mother isn't any nicer.
In Zero No Tsukaima, once Saito becomes Louise's familiar his new life consists of waiting on Louise practically both day and night. This includes washing her laundry and helping her get dressed, among other things. Louise eventually mellows out, more or less, later on.
Victorian Romance Emma: Emma was born in a seaside village where she was given tough jobs and regularly physically and verbally abused. Luckily, she gained a better life after Kelly Stowner took her under her wing and trained her to be a maid.
The Pound Puppies has Holly, an orphan, who is constantly abused/exploited by her stepmother and stepsister. By the end of the first season, it was implied she inherited their house, and lived happily ever after. Then came the second season...

Comic Books

Billy Batson (and his sister, Mary) who would grow up to become Captain Marvel, belonged to a wealthy family but lost his fortune after his parents died and he was sent to an orphanage by his evil Uncle Ebenezer, who actually made a Deal With The Devil to keep his fortune. Despite this, Billy still saves his soul from Satan.
Usagi Yojimbo: Kitsune's backstory. After her mom who really ran the family business died, her "jellyfish" of a father married a mean and shrewish woman (note: not an actual shrew) who spent all their money and eventually convinced him to sell their daughter to an inn.

Literature

Jane Eyre's life with her aunt and two snobby cousins wasn't very pleasant but then again, the orphanage she later went to turned out to be no trip to the beach either.
James And The Giant Peach: After an escaped rhino eats James parents, James goes to live with his two cruel aunts, Aunt Sponge and Aunt Spiker who play this trope to its hilt.
In "The Claidi Journals" by Tanith Lee, this is pretty much Claidi's life before she meets Nemain and escapes with him.
The Baudelaire siblings. They are sent from one Illegal Guardian and useless caretaker to the next, after their parents die in a fire, and their first guardian, Count Olaf, was pretty much the worst of them. It's revealed that he didn't care about them at all and merely wanted their fortune and was trying to kill them to get it. As such, he makes his hatred and hostility towards them quite clear during their time with him. He makes them sleep in one sparsely decorated bedroom together, with a uncomfortable bed, and no crib for Sunny. Also, he usually leaves them a long list of difficult and tedious chores to do, while he's out for the day. He also abuses them.
- In the tenth book, "The Slippery Slope", Sunny resides with Count Olaf and his henchmen on top of a snowy mountain after being captured by them. She ends up becoming a servant for the whole group, including cooking meals in freezing temperatures, doing the washing/cleaning, setting and clearing tables, and sleeping in a casserole dish.
The Fairy Godmother, the first of Mercedes Lackey's "Tales of the Five Hundred Kingdoms" series, starts out this way. Subverted in that the ambient magic in the land (The Tradition) wants Elena to go to a ball and marry the prince, but the prince is only 11 years old.
- Also Phoenix and Ashes from her Edwardian Fairy Tales/Elemental Masters series, where protagonist Eleanor's evil stepmother has magically bound her to the house in order to make use of her family fortune.
Chiyo from Memoirs Of A Geisha is sold into a life of servitude at a young age and works for the proprietress of geisha house before she is trained to become a Geisha under Mameha.
Harry Potter, before he gets sent off to Hogwarts, and even later on his Uncle Dursley never does stop treating him like crap.
- Lampshaded in Half-Blood Prince, though, when Dumbledore visits Privet Drive and spells out to them what terrible guardians they have been.
- Then his cousin Dudley reveals he doesn't think Harry is "worthless" at all! and in the future, they've made their peace and their kids get together for play-dates.
Ella Enchanted: It's basically a retelling of Cinderella in which Ella's stepmother becomes angry at her for living in her house like a lady when she is actually poor, so when Ella's father Sir Peter is away on business, she turns Ella into a servant.
- In a somewhat similar vein there's another retelling of Cinderella called Just Ella.
  - Umm... "Just Ella" is about what happens in Cinderella after the marriage: this is more of a Celebrity Is Overrated example.
In A Little Princess, Sara is packed off to a boarding school for formal education. However, after a few years, word comes that her beloved father is dead, and that his fortune is spent.
- Since Sara can no longer pay for her education, Miss Minchin, the cruel owner of the boarding school, dismisses Sara's maid, confiscates her possessions (except for her doll Emily), moves her into a drafty attic room, and forces Sara to work as a servant. In addition to that, former fellow students like Lavinia start to treat her like she's less than trash.
In Anne Of Green Gables, Anne lived with a few stern, bossy foster parents before she moved in with the kinder Marilla and Matthew.
The Bride in The Song of Songs justifies her dark complexion with this:
Do not stare at me because I am swarthy,
because the sun has burned me.
My brothers have been angry with me;
they charged me with the care of the vineyards:
my own vineyard I have not cared for.

Film

The Parent Trap (original and remake)
The movie Ever After starring Drew Barrymore.
The movie A Cinderella Story starring Hillary Duff.

Fairy Tale

Cinderella, of course. Including such variants as The Story of Tam and Cam, The Sharp Grey Sheep, and Rushen Coatie.
- In Finette Cendron, and Fair, Brown, and Trembling, the heroine's sisters do the same thing.
In The Three Little Men In the Wood, the Wicked Stepmother oppresses her stepdaughter until she sends her into the woods on an Impossible Task to kill her.
In The Well of the World's End, heavy housework again culminated in an Impossible Task.
In Vasilissa the Beautiful, the heroine has to do all the housework, managing only with her magical doll, until her stepsisters send her to get fire from Baba Yaga.
In The Green Knight, Cenerentola, and The Hearth Cat, the stepmother had actually persuaded the stepdaughter to ask her father to marry her, but proceeded to oppress her as soon as she was married.
In Katie Woodencloak, the stepmother turned Katie out to tend the cows. When she finds that a dun cow is magically helping her, she set out to have the cow killed. Katie ran away.
In The Story of the Black Cow, the stepmother starves her stepson.