Review: ALICE BY HEART at West Valley Arts is Both Fanciful and Melancholy

ALICE BY HEART, playing at West Valley Arts, fights for the strength that comes from friendship and imagination against all odds.

ALICE BY HEART (music by Duncan Sheik, lyrics by Steven Sater, book by Steven Sater and Jessie Nelson) is set in a London tube station during the Blitz of World War II. Alice Spencer wants desperately to retell Lewis Carroll’s ALICE’S ADVENTURES IN WONDERLAND to her dear friend Alfred Hallam, who has been diagnosed with tuberculosis, before it’s too late. 

Ivy Dunbar Jones plays Alice with passion, and Charlie Baytieh plays Alfred/White Rabbit/March Hare with sensitivity.

Rachel Mardis as the Red Cross Nurse/Queen of Hearts, Makayla Palos Rodriguez as The Cheshire Cat, April Kerr and Olivia Lane as the Caterpillars, and Carly Haberman as the Queen of Diamonds have vocals that really shine.

Sam Teuscher is a fierce Duchess, with additional highlights including Isaac Carrillo as the Mad Hatter, Monte Garcia as Dr. Butridge/King of Hearts/Jabberwock, Trevor Williams as the Mock Turtle, and Noah Lees as the Dormouse.

While the musical itself can feel ponderous at times, director Brooklynn Pulver Kohler and choreographer Emily Henwood have pieced together a creativity-fueled production presented with intriguing staging.

Scenic designer Morgan Golightly, lighting designer Renee Fowler, costume designer Tabitha Sublette, and wig/makeup designer Savanna Finley each contributed greatly to the communal vision of the show with colorful splashes of fancy atop a base of war-torn melancholy.

ALICE BY HEART plays through June 28, 2025.  For tickets, call the box office at 801-965-5140 or visit www.wvcarts.org.

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