From April 24 to 26, wishes and fantasies coalesced on stage at UB Center for the Arts in the form of “Into the Woods,” a musical proudly presented by the Department of Theatre and Dance. Created by duo James Lapine and Stephen Sondheim, “Into the Woods” weaves together the stories of household tales like Jack and the Beanstalk, Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood and more.
Directed and choreographed by Assistant Teaching Professor James Beaudry, this take on “Into the Woods” lends its success to Beaudry’s extensive experience choreographing and directing for several UB productions, like “The Pajama Game.”
Initially, these beloved characters’ stories start as separate threads, but quickly begin to entwine once reaching the maw of the mysterious forest, aptly referred to as “the woods.” Each individual has their own reason to make the journey through the woods, though they quickly realize that the only way they’ll be able to make it to their fairy tale endings is by working together.
Little Red Riding Hood, played by freshman music theatre major Lily Patterson, must make her way through to get to her grandmother’s house. Cinderella, portrayed by freshman acting major Kyra Vest, and her signature slippers become well acquainted with the forest floor as she does not have the luxury of a pumpkin carriage. Jack, played by junior music theatre major Alex Louis, and his best friend and sickly cow, Milky White, prance and hobble, respectively, through the woods to the market. All of the characters in the story end up in the woods, in one way or another, as if the woods were an entity capable of pulling the strings of fate itself.
The Baker, freshman music theatre major Koby Fallon, and the Baker’s wife, senior theatre major Caroline Jameson, also have their own reason to enter the woods. The Baker’s bloodline was cursed by the Witch, depicted by freshman music theatre major Emmie Chin, to be forever barren, but the couple desperately wants a child. The Witch presents only one solution: provide her with four ingredients for a potion, and she’ll reverse her curse.
The ingredients may sound familiar to those who know the Grimms’ fairy tales. The grocery list is as follows: a milk-white cow, a blood-red cape, hair as yellow as corn and a slipper as pure as gold.
The vivid immersion of each scene is, no doubt, thanks to how the actors moved across the stage, deft, measured and fluid. One could clearly tell that they had rehearsed their director’s choreography to perfection.
There is a storm of things director-choreographer Beaudry has to consider when creating a production like “Into the Woods.” He explains, “I don’t change the text or the musical score, but I think about how each character encounters the world. What causes a character to behave — to act? That’s the puzzle of directing.”
Beaudry also has to determine when to exercise his directorial power to help fully realize his vision of the production. “Keeping everyone who’s passed or run away onstage watching [the surviving characters take their stories into their own hands] is a directorial choice I made, but one theme of the show is about growing into one’s authentic self, and that requires reconciling the person you’ve become with the ghosts of your past,” he says.
Set designer Lisa Gallagher, a senior theatre design and technology major, also deserves major props for her extraordinary work on the staging of the musical. Gallagher managed to capture the enigmatic allure of the woods within the confines of the stage, making the audience feel as though the stage were dynamic and infinite as a real forest.
When creating this set, she drew from many sources of inspiration.
“The two upstage drops were inspired by Chiharu Shiota’s fabric installation art. Her style of entangled line-work was visually manipulated to represent a forest, while maintaining the harrowing nature of such entropic fabric pieces,” she explains. To convey the sheer magnitude of the mysterious grove, Gallagher emphasizes verticality, giving the illusion that the forest spreads far beyond the stage space.
Furthermore, Gallagher describes the success and effectiveness of the set of “Into the Woods” as a culmination of bits and pieces from everyone who has had a hand in the production in any manner.
“The set would not have been as successful if it weren’t for all those involved, from the technical director down to students who attended one or two paint calls. The community effort for each production is the highlight for me, and what drew me to theater in the first place.”
For many members of the main cast, “Into the Woods” is their debut entry onto the stages of UB, and they absolutely knocked it out of the park. Patterson embodied the role of Little Red to a tee, tuning her voice and mannerisms to express the young girl’s naïve, sometimes brash, but deeply feeling character.
Chin’s vocals wowed the audience with her rendition of “Last Midnight,” and her portrayal of the complex motivations and tragedy of the Witch brought some audience members to tears.
After seeing “Into the Woods,” it is no wonder that it is a beloved classic. With a runtime of 2 hours and 30 minutes, the musical developed multiple intricate plotlines of a large cast of characters with incredible pacing, a shining example of the perfect execution of a careful balancing act between comedy and tragedy.
If you missed the opportunity to witness this enchanting musical for yourself, there will be segments of the performance at “Spring Into Art” on April 28.
The arts desk can be reached at arts@ubspectrum.com
Photo: Courtesy of Myanmar Student Association
