INTO THE WOODS Opens May 8th At Lakewood Theatre Company

An ambivalent Cinderella? A blood-thirsty Little Red Ridinghood? A Prince Charming with a roving eye? A Witch...who raps? They're all among the cockeyed characters in James Lapine and Stephen Sondheim's fractured fairy tale opening at Lakewood Theatre Company on Friday May 8, 2009.

In this follow-up to their 1984 Pulitzer Prize-winning Sunday in the Park With George, composer Stephen Sondheim and writer James Lapine put the Grimm fairy tale characters of Cinderella, Little Red Ridinghood, Jack and the Beanstalk, the Baker and his wife all in the same woods to speculate about what lies beyond "the happily ever after."  But don't expect them to live happily ever after ...  This  Lakewood production, with stage direction by Wade Willis and musical direction by Alan D. Lytle, will continue through Sunday June 14, playing Thursday through Saturday nights at 8:00 PM,  Sundays at 7:00 PM (May 10,17, 24, 31 June 14) and Sunday matinees at 2:00 PM (May 17, June 7 and 14). Show Sponsor: The Dorothea M. Lensch Fund/Oregon Community Foundation

The theatre is located at Lakewood Center for the Arts, 368 S. State St. in Lake Oswego. Tickets are $28.00 for adults and $26.00 for students and senior citizens. For reservations call 503-635-3901 or order online at www.lakewood-center.org.

For many of us, fairy tales were a mainstay in growing-up. They afforded a neat escape from disciplining parents (who often turned up in the tales as insensitive tyrants) and the guarantee that, once the evil-doers were vanquished, all the good people (meaning you) would live happily ever after. But life being what it is, happily ever after is in short supply after the age of 12, which is perhaps one reason why Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine wrote Into the Woods, a spellbinding tale which makes those old childhood stories fresh and relevant to modern adult audiences.

A narrator (Doren Elias) introduces a cast of fairy tale characters who will venture into the woods, each in pursuit of his own quest. In one of two houses drawn from the brothers Grimm is Cinderella (Marissa Neitling) taunted by her cruel step sisters. In another house is Jack (James Langston Drake) of beanstalk fame and his aging mother (Emily Beleele). Occupying a third dwelling is the more realistic couple invented by Lapine: a childless Baker (Shawn Rogers) and his wife (Pam Mahon).

"I wish" is the repeated phrase that links these characters together. Cinderella wishes to go to a royal festival. Jack's mother wishes for money to ease their hunger. The Baker and his wife wish for a child.

Living next door to the Baker and his wife is a wicked Witch (Erin Charles) who has a stolen daughter, Rapunzel (Teresa Renee Lawrence), whom she keeps locked in a tower. The Witch has cast a spell over the Baker and his wife leaving them childless, but she promises to give them a baby if the couple will bring her a cow as white as milk, a cape as red as blood, a slipper as pure as gold and hair as yellow as corn.

When the Baker and his wife enter the woods, in search of these objects, their paths keep colliding with those of Cinderella, now in her ball gown, and Jack, who's off to sell his beloved cow. The woods are crisscrossed by others, among them Little Red Ridinghood (Jill Westerby), a Wolf (Isaac Lamb), and two handsome princes, one (Isaac Lamb) for Cinderella and another (Nathan Dunkin) for Rapunzel. Soon the characters bond together as a community searching for ways to overcome the evil Witch's spell. By the end of the first act they sing and dance in their new found optimism about living happily ever after.

But they don't.

By Act II, the widow of a giant slain by Jack shows up for revenge and drives everyone back into the woods. Suddenly our story book characters realize all that appears what is ... isn't. The giantess, although unseen, storms through the forest and the threat she poses has been likened allegorically to many social and political dilemmas which face us today. When full blown selfishness erupts over this and other troubles, our once familiar friends begin to uncomfortably resemble a depiction of the "Me" generation.

Sondheim and Lapine carefully weave the woods into a metaphor for the uncaring world that transforms us. Some of the things that happen there - the blinding of a romantically inclined prince; the infidelity of his brother prince; random deaths - make it clear this fairy-tale show is not aimed at small children.  Underneath the tales of princes and paupers, warts and witches, Sondheim and Lapine actually deal with the trials of growing up, the attainment of maturity and the proof of one's humanity.

But with or without allusive implications, this musical story jolts its passive characters - and spectators - into a world where every action has its moral consequence. The royal family proves unheroic and useless in a crisis. Neighborliness among the peasants turns to mistrust in a brilliant song of mutual finger pointing, Your Fault. Yet what comes out of this chaos is not the jollity of happy endings, but a deeper reassurance, born of tolerance and community and shared sacrifice, articulated in the haunting ballad,  No One is Alone - a song which so eloquently distills the play's "message" that selfishness is not the way to achieve happiness.

In 1988, Into The Woods, won Tony Awards for Best Score and Best Book as well as the Drama Desk and N.Y. Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Musical.  In 1989,  Into the Woods was selected as Best Musical Cast Album at the 31st annual Grammy Awards.

The 19 member cast of Into the Woods at Lakewood Theatre Company also includes Kristi Foster, Rani Lightle, Mary Erwin, James Montgomery, Felicia Heaton, Jim Crino, Kylie Clarke Johnson and Sarah Wesley.

Musical direction for Lakewood's production is by Alan D. Lytle, the assistant director is Brian Bartley, and stage design is by Rod Langdahl. Lighting design is by Kurt Herman, mask and wig design is by Diane Trapp, properties are by Felix Kelsey, costume design is by John Gerth, the stage manager is Neil Taylor and the producer is Kay Vega.

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