Into the Woods

The music and lyrics for Into the Woods are by Stephen Sondheim, and a book by James Lapine. They take favourite storybook characters and weave them into much more darker tales. 

If a Baker and his wife wish to have a child, they must first break a spell cast by a neighbouring witch, complying with her bizarre requests by embarking on a scavenger hunt which takes them through memorable fairy tales. Each of the fairy tale characters are all searching for what they most desire, but when the various stories collide, they find out that all you wish for isn’t always what you get in the end. 

The setting was a Library with side flats depicting book shelves, a backcloth of the inside of the building, a central furniture unit, a book trolley, a large chair and a globe of the world. The stage at Hasland Playhouse is very small so to have various scene changes, as is supposedly required, would be difficult to achieve but what better setting for telling a story about characters from books, than a library - a brilliant concept and it really worked. You just needed a little imagination and after all, that’s what fairy tales are all about!

Sam Ellis was first-rate as the Narrator initially telling us about the wishes that are important to the various characters and also keeping us up to date throughout. Sam also wonderfully played the Mysterious Man. Matthew Szadura was excellent as the Baker. He superbly sang and acted the role conveying the complexities of the character so masterfully. There was great chemistry between himself and his wife who was so convincingly and impressively played by Chloe Hunnington. I loved her expression of ‘happiness’ after her ‘rendezvous’ with Cinderella’s Prince! What a fabulous Witch was portrayed by Emily Skill. She totally captured the menacing, sinister and conniving aspects marvellously with her fabulous singing and piercing screams, but she did transform to become quite glamorous later on.The sweet, pure voice of Lauren Turner was perfect for the role of Cinderella which she so beautifully sang and acted with such tenderness. Evie Davis-Pullinger excelled as Little Red Riding Hood. She was perkily innocent and managed to squeeze out every ounce of humour from the part quite brilliantly. Another fine performance came from William Cousins as Jack. He brought out the child-like naivety yet adventurous nature of the character, so engagingly and he so movingly sang ‘I Guess This Is Goodbye’ to his cow. (The cow was a head fastened to a board and when it needed to move it was attached to the front of the book trolley - ingenious!) Josh Skeldon also excelled as both of the characters he played. As the wolf he was threateningly fearsome with his gruff voice and terrifying movements together with his sleazy and captivating expressiveness and as Cinderella’s Prince he was superb and hilariously over-the-top as the swaggering, vain and disloyal lover. Leighton Hendon’s splendid portrayal as Rapunzel’s Prince was much more sedate and their duet ‘Agony‘was just top notch. Jane Goodwin as the Stepmother, together with her daughters, Florinda played by Rebekah Petrillo and Lucinda played by Charlotte Pell were an awesome trio bringing out their mean-spirited and demanding demeanour towards Cinderella, magnificently. Zoe Davis-Pullinger was terrific as Jack’s strong-willed, independent mother, Mia Beardsley was delightfully graceful as Rapunzel and excellent support came from Roland Molnar as the Steward, Nicola Smith as Granny, Eleanor Goddard-Molyneux as Cinderella’s mother and as Sleeping Beauty, Sophie Taylor as Snow White and Freya Tinsley as the Giant. 

I’ve already mentioned the wonderful set and together with good lighting and sound and absolutely fabulous costumes and make-up, this show proved to be exceptional. Sondheim’s music is so complex and difficult but all of the singing by all of the cast members in solo, duets and group numbers was just outstanding. My one gripe is that the show is too long but the cast never faltered and after singing over 24 numbers plus reprises they were still as fresh and exuberant at the end of the show as they were at the beginning - just remarkable. Many, many congratulations to the hard working and outstanding cast, to the Creative Director, Joshua Mason, to the Musical Director, Melanie Gilbert and to everyone else involved for what was a superlative production. Many thanks also to you Joshua, for the warmest of welcomes.

Joyce Handbury

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