Dazzling trip to dark side of fairy tales
Into the Woods at the Theatre Royal, Bath is a major production, one of the biggest ever in the city with incredible puppetry and special effects.
This new production by award winning Terry Gilliam (Monty Python) and Leah Hausman is majestic and breathtaking at times, with giant size puppets, incredible movement and lots and lots of surprises and humour.
A huge celebration of the music and lyrics by the late great Stephen Sondheim, the staging and set design is masterful with monumental performances by a talented ensemble cast.
It is an incredible feat by the Theatre Royal to stage this massive production which they bravely rescued after it was cancelled by The Old Vic in London.
Into the Woods is a modern adult fairy tale which cleverly weaves the story of Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Rapunzel and Jack and the Beanstalk into a new narrative brought together by a dark, scheming narrator or ‘mysterious man’. The marvellous storytelling by James Lapine highlights the dark side of these fairy tales, the wolf in Little Red Riding Hood is a smooth talking, flirtatious older man in a crisp suit and fur coat.
His dance moves and choreography are so menacing and the part is played wonderfully by Nathanael Campbell, who doubles up as Rapunzel’s prince in an equally good performance.
There is so much humour in this production, Cinderella’s Prince Charming is hilariously and camply played by Henry Jenkinson as the meandering, love hungry prince.
The first half seems almost complete by the interval, with happy endings all round, leaving audiences wondering where can it go from here.
But it is the second half that is the better story, what happens after the happy-ever-after ending? After the big wedding?
At the opening of the second act Prince Charming is bored, Cinderella is boring and life is not that great, and in a hilarious scene we see him making love to the baker’s wife on the side.
The woods are like another character in this magical production, the trees come to life, things go bump in the night and deer and animals played by actors with incredible masks are in almost every scene.
The woods have always been a popular setting for dark stories and this production really plays on that, bringing the trees to life.
Dark things happen in the woods, it is eerie and menacing.
Sondheim’s lyrics are typically wonderful to fit the stories, exhausting for the actors but exhilarating for audiences.
Into the Woods is a marvellous, larger than life production for the Theatre Royal, but it does feel too long and is such a lot for any audience to take in, almost too much at times.
It feels like some editing needs to be done but that does not take from the fact this is an incredible feat by a most talented cast and production team and utterly ambitious for Gilliam and Hausman.
It is a sheer delight and should not be missed.
Into the Woods continues at the Theatre Royal, Bath until Saturday, September 10.
For tickets visit www. theatreroyal.org.uk or telephone 01225 448844.