Looking Back: Original INTO THE WOODS Actors Not So Good?- Page 2

[uncageg]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 2:11pm

ITW is one of my all time favorites. Did not get a chance to see the revival, but after hearing it...was glad I didn't see it. Vanessa Williams made me cringe. And I like Vanessa.

[justme2]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 2:24pm

I loved watching Joanna Gleason in the show! I thought she was wonderful as the Bakers wife. I also thought that the stepsisters were great; I was a big Kay McClelland fan then because of her work in City of Angels. Whatever happened to her?

[WISHIHADATONY]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 2:27pm

I worship Bernadette Peters!! Love her to death. BUT, she was legendarily DREADFUL as the witch.. Of course her singing was gorgeous, but her acting was embarassing. Whatever you see on the video?---it was worse live in the theater, trust me. She seemed to be doing a bad job in a bad skit on the Carol Burnett show. She just could not act this part and was shockingly bad. She deservedly did NOT receive a Tony nomination for her performance. I still cannot believe how the divine Bernadette's acting was so dreadful in INTO THE WOODS.

[Michael Bennett]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 2:29pm

Not to thread jack, but I saw a terrific production of INTO THE WOODS this week in Los Angeles at the SBCLO -- it was basically a recreation of the original James Lapine staging and featured several performers -- Mary Gordon Murray, as the Baker's Wife and Tracy Katz as Red Riding Hood who did the show on Broadway and during the first tour. The entire cast was terrific, with a special mention to Kim Huber as Cinderella. Gorgeous.
Updated On: 5/2/05 at 02:29 PM

[DAME]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 2:33pm

WISHIHADATONY,
You just asked someone to trust you? HA!

Bernadette was pretty good in into the woods. Nothing special. But ok.

[bwaysinger]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 2:34pm

Kim Huber is fantabulous. Why she is spending her time in LA is beyond me, there's plenty of roles here in NYC for her.

[Rathnait62]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 2:35pm

WISH, please tell us that that post was an April Fool's joke a little late...

[DAME]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 2:36pm

I love Kim Huber. As to why she is in LA? I wuld suspect the lady wants to make a decent living. In case you are not aware.. theater does not pay much.

[sparky310]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 2:36pm

wow you certainly saw a different show...i

[doodlenyc]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 2:38pm

I dont think that Bernadette was dreadful as the witch...but the Carol Burnett reference was very good! I think that Vanessa was the same...not real enuf (next to the revival Jack's mother, tho, she was fabulous!) I love the show, but couldnt believe that a better cast couldnt be put together for the revival! Everyone in it was terrible, especially LRRH who was like a stump on stage, and Jack's mother who couldnt remember a line the night I saw it.
The only good performers were John McMartin, and the Cinderella understudy I saw...she was charming...and, of course, Milky White!

[Michael Bennett]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 2:38pm

Kim Huber is from California originally apparently. She's married and has a kid now. I assume she's focusing on that and does theatre on the side.

[justme2]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 2:40pm

No one out there knows what happened to Kay McClelland??

[OnTheAisle]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 2:42pm

I saw both the original and the revival, and I have to give a nod to certain performances in the original (Bernadette, Joanna Gleason especially). I prefer the performances from ITW Original, but prefered the set from the Revival (how's that for diplomatic)...

(Course, Bernadette could read the phone book and win a Tony, IMHO)

[allamarane]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 3:02pm

Danielle was in "A Year With Frog and Toad" when it hit Broadway. I think she's getting ready to open "She Stoops to Conquer" at the Irish Repertory Theatre this week.

Didn't Kay McClelland take over the role of Elsa in the latest Sound of Music revival? That's the last I heard of her.

[justme2]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 3:09pm

Finally!! Someone knows something about Kay!! Thank you for the info!

The last I heard, she was understudying the Anna role in "The King and I" and that was around 1999/2000 I think.

[seasons of love]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 4:42pm

Agreeing with OnTheIsle about the phone book comment. :)

I love Bernadette and I think that she did a wonderful job with the Witch. I preferred her performance over that of Vanessa Williams' performance.

[showmethetony]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 5:12pm

i'm getting ready for ITW auditions at my community theater in a couple of weeks so I just watched the dvd on friday to get myself psyched. My first experience with ITW was with the movie and the first time I saw the show on stage was at a high school in the middle of nowhere...I love the show. It is one of the few shows I can see over and over and the messages are still poignant to me. Whether or not you think Bernadette was good, the fact is that she set the standard for the role of the Witch...I had the chance to play the witch in college and it was incredibly difficult not to do it Bernie style after watching her and listening to the recording...

I didn't care much for Vanessa on the revival recording...Just as an interesting tidbit - did other folks hear that Billy Porter was also being considered for the Witch in the revival? Imagine how different THAT would have been...I LOOOOOOOOOVE him - just saw his show Ghetto Superstar a couple of weeks ago in Pittsburgh - I laughed and cried my eyes out...He is truly talented...

[justme2]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 5:14pm

Wasn't Greg Eddelman in the newer version? Anybody have any thoughts on his performance?

[The Distinctive Baritone]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 7:31pm

I thought Gregg Edelman was great. When I first heard he was cast, I was like, "umm...OK...," because he's not really the physical type. But they gave him a wig and he gave a really funny interpretation of the role, the best of the three actors that I've seen in the part (not including my own performance of course, when I played Cinderella's Prince several years ago...lol...I wasn't very good, actually).

Overall though, I think that the original cast on the DVD is far superior to that of the revival, except for Chip Zien, who I agree was too whiny and wasn't particularly effective. I'm not a fan of his thin, nasal singing voice either.

[Mr. Tuttle]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 9:21pm

Wow. Wish..you have proven that you really have no taste or idea of what a compelling Broadway performance is.

However, considering you would make up horrible lies about Marc Shamin, I'm not that suprised.

And JustMe2...you need to do search for "What Happened To". It was a BBW thread back last Decemeber and I found Kay. She's out of the business.

[justme2]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 10:09pm

OK, I just went in to the search and looked it up, as instructed. All I found were a number of whatever happened to threads , one Whatever happened to Ann Crumb thread, and one whatever happened to Kim Crosby thread. I read through the threads, and no mention of Kay. Then I searched on Kay McClelland's name, and nothing came up.

What did you find and where!? How am I missing this information?

[Jon]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 10:57pm

I heard that Kay McClelland sort of gave up the business and went back to her home town of Atlanta. Her last NYC credit was standing by for Faith Prince in KNIG AND I. I really liked her - she was a real martini-sipping, cigarette-smoking "broad" - in the nicest sense of the term.

Besides FROG AND TOAD, Danielle also had a nice role in the Woody Allen film "Mighty Aphrodite" in the mid 1990's. And she played Fredrica in the NYCO LITLE NIGHT MUSIC in 1990.

[justme2]

Posted: 5/2/05 at 11:55pm

Thanks for the info, Jon. I always liked her as well. I remember reading a chapter of the "Broadway Stories" book some years back and she was profiled for her work as Joanna Gleason's understudy in Nick and Nora. She sounded like a real honest, great person to know as well and I am dissapointed she's no longer in the business. I love her voice on City of Angels.

[Bal]

Posted: 5/3/05 at 12:35am

What else has Ben Wright done? It's impossible to find him on google (except on Amazon or whatever in the cast of the ITW dvd...) and I'm rather in love with him.

I love the OBC because the audience SO believed them. When the prince snubs the Baker's Wife and leaves and a few people in the audience boo...I thought that was wonderful.

[Ourtime992]

Posted: 5/3/05 at 3:46am

Ben Wright was in State Fair (1996 season). That's the only credit I know of for sure.

I watched a few more minutes of the tape today while trying to get my son to take a nap, and I remembered what I have always considered the glaring weak link of the production: Merle Louise, anywhere she appears. She is frighteningly expressionistic as Granny and Cinderella's mother. It's a classic case of the actress being given very little material and trying to make every line count by drawing it out and gesturing broadly across the stage. She has always irritated me. Updated On: 5/3/05 at 03:46 AM