Into the Woods Observation- Page 2

[Reginald Tresilian]

Posted: 8/1/14 at 8:39pm

Maila FTW.

[broadwayguy2]

Posted: 8/2/14 at 12:11am

It is all good, magical. I think you were looking at the plot as super linear and not as a weird time warp where much is a retelling by the narrator, where the characters then take control and change destiny with their acts.. One of the ultimate lessons of the show... Every action has a consequence, often time very very unexpected.

Yes, the Witch manipulates and is very selfish and she views herself as morally superior... It is not about overlooking it, it is the factvthatvmost do not focus.. Gain, the unexpected element... The "superior" character is no better and no more powerful as a creature in the end.

All of these discussed topics are part of what make the show so rich :) and one of my favorites,

[PeterPan2]

Posted: 8/2/14 at 8:33am

Plus the whole show revolves around magic and you can't question magic cause it's magic there's no rules to it anything is possible

[broadwayguy2]

Posted: 8/2/14 at 12:12pm

Magic has rules.
Magic must always rules.
It is part of how you distinguish magic and nonsense.

[MagicalMusical]

Posted: 8/2/14 at 7:24pm

Yea I agree broadwayguy2

[MadAboutTheBoy]

Posted: 8/2/14 at 9:37pm

One other observation/question: How can the narrator be the baker's son? Don't the characters inhabit a time around the early modern era? The narrator's dress (shirt, tie, blazer), at least in the OBC, would suggest he lives in the modern (post-modern?) era, no? Aren't they separated by generations, if not hundreds of years?

[icecreambenjamin]

Posted: 8/2/14 at 9:46pm

I thought the narrator was the Baker's great-great-great-grandson and he died without passing the rest of the story on so his children or grandchildren had to improvise the rest of the story.

[MagicalMusical]

Posted: 8/2/14 at 11:17pm

I think the reason the Witch can still admonish the others for being cruel and selfish and getting their wishes is that her wish-getting didn't cause consequences like theirs did. Updated On: 8/4/14 at 11:17 PM

[broadwayguy2]

Posted: 8/3/14 at 3:34am

The. "Period " for the costumes is incredibly nonspecific, including for the narrator, in the original production and that has nothing to do with how things were originally imagined. Heck, the out of town try oit was VERY different visually.

Magical, it did... She egged them all on. She just refuses to own it for much of the show and she feels superior to them.

[MagicalMusical]

Posted: 8/4/14 at 12:51am

What consequences did she cause that hurt others besides herself? And in the end, doesn't she own up to all she did by saying "give me the blame"?

[ChairinMain]

Posted: 8/4/14 at 3:34am

The Reveal that the Narrator as the Baker's Son was indeed part of the show during the previews of the original broadway run. It was cut after a few performances, and I don't think we are intended to read that into the script (unless you're Timothy Sheader, who made casting a child in the role work very well).

Incidentally, am I the only one who feels that double-casting the Narrator and the Mysterious Man actually weakens the show? I am in favor of the other traditional doubling (Wolf/Prince and Granny/Giant/Cinderella's Mother) but I feel like having him play the mysterious man can reduce the impact of the narrator's death and also the impact of the moment where the characters drag him into the story. (He's already been a part of the story, in disguise. Why is this such a big deal?)

I'll admit my feelings might be impacted by a production I saw a few weeks ago where the two characters were not only doubled but amalgamated: no costume change was made to differentiate them except that the narrator wore a top hat, which he did not wear as the Mysterious Man. The hat got a lot of play: when he was wearing it he was "invisible" and the Mysterious Man "disappeared" simply by putting on the hat. Then, at the moment where the characters decide to kill him, he made a big show of accidentally leaving the hat off. It really did not work.

In any case, what ARE the benefits of doubling these two roles? Thoughts?

[broadwayguy2]

Posted: 8/4/14 at 1:47pm

Chair,
I do not believe that you are "supposed" to read in that the Narrator is the (now adult) son of the Baker and Wife, but it certainly still there to find in that context clue at the finale and gives something interesting for the actors to play with... for an audience member, it makes the Narrator's death cut far more deeply.
As far as the doubling, again it plays off of that too me.. Having the Baker's father and his son portrayed by the same actor plays with the themes of no one REALLY leaving, things coming full circle. I DO feel ot important that the two roles are ery different in how they appear and how they are played, but the switch must be able to be made quickly.
Your view, as you said, does seem to be colored. He is not part of the story "in disguise".. He is an entirely different character.
I have NEVER felt that having a child play the Narrator works.

Magical,
I have always taken it to be more of a sarcastic "give me the blame", not a genuine acceptance. She is accusing them of not accepting their blame and taking responsibility and saying "fine, keeping blaming me if you want to" after they all started accusing each other before turning on her.
How did she hurt others? Almost every event that happens is spured by her command to the Baker and Wife to collect the otems and her manipulation to make it happen.

[MagicalMusical]

Posted: 8/4/14 at 5:53pm

I feel like you're doing the "You're Fault" song to blame the Witch. The Witch putting the events into motion is not the same as her being responsible for HOW they filled her wish. She never told the Baker and his Wife to lie, or for Jack to climb the beanstalk, or for Cinderella to marry the Prince.

[broadwayguy2]

Posted: 8/4/14 at 6:42pm

No, she did not command HOW, but she put events into motion and egged them on along the way and did, in fact, encourag them to stral - specifically, the cape.
And no, I am not "assigning" Yoir Fault to blame the Witch. But i am saying that the characters end up blaming her and her "acceptance" is not genuine, but a sarcastic reply.

[MagicalMusical]

Posted: 8/5/14 at 5:48pm

Well I guess she did make a boy sad about losing his cow and a girl sad about losing her cape. I suppose they were all to blame too and she didn't really take it.

[broadwayguy2]

Posted: 8/5/14 at 8:59pm

The entire idea of the songs is that no one and all of them are to blame.. The Witch responds in last Midnight that all of them are wrong and she is right and she will let them blame her only if she gets to sacrifice Jack,

[MagicalMusical]

Posted: 8/6/14 at 12:49am

Yea.

[Showface]

Posted: 8/6/14 at 12:37pm

This is an interesting theory (not mine) on what the Witch meant by "raping" in the rap. I always thought it meant "taking", but this brings on a whole new meaning.

This is the theory.

_________________________________________________________
No, sweety. You're very wrong. There's very obvious clues in the music and the fairytale itself that it was in fact rape. Shall I explain?

First of all, if we're going to get technical with literary terms, I will first point out the meaning of the word "metaphor". Sondheim is genius at it, because he uses a few metaphors, and tricking you into thinking "rape" is one of them. It's not. It's very literal. You see, the Witch's garden is literally a metaphor for her body. That's why that picture above is BRILLIANT, because it's a literal translation of the metaphor. Her beans, on the other hand, are a metaphor for her virginity, which her mother warned her never to lose.

So, the MM stole the Witch's virginity, and her mother was PISSED at the Witch, b/c not only did she do the one thing she told her not to, but she probably thought the Witch did it willingly. So, what was her punishment? She turned her into a HIDEOUS creature. Why? So no man would EVER touch her again. Then, what was the Witch's punishment for the MM? She took his child, something he robbed of her. By raping her, he took away her ability ever to have children, and, on top of that, because of him her mother made it so no man would ever WANT to have kids with her. So, she took what she believed to be rightfully hers.

From there, she locks Rapunzel in a tower, repeating her mother's own cycle of preventing her from experiencing a man's touch (hense why the tower is ironically shaped like a fallace), only THIS TIME, the Witch wanted to make absolutely SURE Rapunzel would be safe, so she went as far as locking her away. So, please, explain why the Witch would want to keep Rapunzel in a [Phallus] shaped tower away from men if she had not had a traumatizing experience herself?

Furthermore, if we must look into song/lyric examples to prove this point, look at "Witch's Lament" for a just example.

In "Witch's Lament" the Witch says,

"This is the world I meant.
Couldn't you listen?
Couldn't you stay content,
Safe behind walls,
As I could not?"

Pray tell, my dear, if the Witch was NOT raped, what was she referring to? When was she ever "not safe" behind her mother's walls?

Credit: Jman383 Musicals.net (or whatever the website's called)
______________________________________________________

Discuss


Updated On: 8/6/14 at 12:37 PM

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 8/6/14 at 2:10pm

You don't lock a daughter in a tower before the onset of menses.

Aha! So she wasn't alone in the tower all that time. Aunt Flo visited her once a month.

[HBP]

Posted: 8/6/14 at 2:19pm

I truly don't think the Witch was raped or that the garden is a metaphor for her body. The literal garden is referenced multiple times the show. The beans are seen and used physically. She sings that she "lost the beans again" in "Last Midnight," and I don't think that means she's lost her virginity twice. I also don't think the Baker's father, who would be the rapist in the Witch's rap, has any explicitly sexual tendencies in the script. If Sondheim or Lapine were going in that direction, I don't think they would have shied away from it, judging from how the Wolf was written.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 8/6/14 at 2:22pm

That person sounds like an asshole with the sweetie and the dear. Then it says it needs to point out the meaning of metaphor but doesn't. And says Sondheim doesn't use many metaphors. And literally a metaphor metaphor literal literal.

[Kad]

Posted: 8/6/14 at 2:29pm

To have a personal theory is fine, sweetie, but to condescendingly lord it over people as a fact is just obnoxious.

Updated On: 8/6/14 at 02:29 PM

[Showface]

Posted: 8/6/14 at 2:29pm

"The beans are seen and used physically. She sings that she "lost the beans again" in "Last Midnight," and I don't think that means she's lost her virginity twice"

I don't nessecarily agree with his theory, but this point was brought up in the discussion. He seems to think the beans carry this double meaning, both physically and metaphorically. According to him, when she says "lost the beans again" it's more of her mocking her mother, rather than a "I threw some beans a couple feet away from me", or "I lost my virginity". That's actually a valid point because the Witch knew where the beans were when she threw them, just at the height of her rage she wanted her mother to kill her, or do something that would just take her away from the grow and the world.

[Mister Matt]

Posted: 8/6/14 at 2:35pm

No, sweety. You're very wrong. There's very obvious clues in the music and the fairytale itself that it was in fact rape. Shall I explain?

Yeah, nothing after a sentence like that is actually worth reading. Literally. As in the old definition of "literally". The one that's the antonym of "metaphorically". I could define "antonym" for the sweetie-darling-darling-sweetie, but Edina Monsoon exists to be laughed at, not with.

[Kad]

Posted: 8/6/14 at 2:35pm

It's a valid point in the sense that there's no other logical way to interpret that line.