Stephen Sondheim Surprises off-Broadway's INTO THE WOODS with Musical Tips Before Opening Night

The New York Post reports that famed composer Stephen Sondheim surprised the cast of Roundabout Theatre Company's small-scale production of Into the Woods with some musical tips prior to opening night.

The show, opening at the Laura Pels Theater, has just 10 actors and one piano player. "Stephen did a musical brush-up with the cast," a spy told the Post. "The cast was sitting in a circle and sang. He gave them notes, tips on 'tempo and cadence' and on parts of the score. It was so great that they got to sing for him."

The show is set to open tomorrow night, January 22nd.

Rob Marshall's big screen adaptation of Into the Woods, starring Meryl Streep, Johnny Depp and Anna Kendrick has pulled in over $116.5 million at the box office. The original musical opened on Broadway in 1987 and starred Bernadette Peters.

About Roundabout Theatre Company's Into the Woods:

Roundabout Theatre Company presents a new Off-Broadway production of Stephen Sondheim & James Lapine's Tony Award-winning Into the Woods. Directed by Noah Brody andBen Steinfeld, this production premiered in May 2013 at the McCarter Theatre in association with the Fiasco Theater.

Into the Woods began preview performances December 18, 2014 and officially opens on January 22, 2015 at theLaura Pels Theatre in the Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre (111 West 46th Street). This is a limited engagement thru March 22, 2015.

Into the Woods features the original McCarter Theatre Center/Fiasco Theater cast, including: Jessie Austrian as "Baker's Wife," Noah Brody as "Lucinda, Wolf & Cinderella's Prince," Matt Castle as "Pianist," Paul L. Coffey as "Mysterious Man," Andy Grotelueschen as "Milky White, Florinda & Rapunzel's Prince," Liz Hayes as "Cinderella's Stepmother & Jack's Mother," Claire Karpen as "Cinderella & Granny," Jennifer Mudge as Witch," Patrick Mulryan as "Jack & Steward," Ben Steinfeldas "Baker" and Emily Young as "Little Red Ridinghood & Rapunzel."

With only 11 actors, one piano and boundless imagination, this witty and wildly theatrical re-invention is Into the Woods like you've never seen it before! This stripped-down, unplugged, thrillingly clever new version includes all the dazzling classic songs like "Children Will Listen" and "Giants in the Sky." Mind the wolf, heed the witch and honor the giant at this extraordinary musical about the power of wishes and what happens when they really do come true.

Roundabout has a long relationship with Stephen Sondheim having produced five Tony Award nominated Sondheim revivals including Company (1995), Follies (2001), Tony Award winning Assassins (2004), Pacific Overtures (2004) and Sunday in the Park with George (2008). In 2005, Roundabout honored Sondheim with the Jason Robards Award for Excellence in Theatre for the indelible impact his life's work has made on the theatre. In 2009 Roundabout presented a one-night only gala concert reading of A Little Night Music. In 2010, Roundabout presented a special Broadway musical tribute to Sondheim entitled Sondheim on Sondheim conceived and directed by Into the Woods' librettist James Lapine and in the same year, renamed Broadway's Henry Millers' Theatre in honor of Mr. Sondheim.

Tickets for Into the Woods are available by calling 212.719.1300, online at www.roundabouttheatre.org, and in person at Roundabout's Laura Pels Theatre Box office (111 West 46th Street). Single tickets for Into the Woods are $99.

Photo Credit: Walter McBride / WM Photos