The Public Theatre's Shakespeare/Park presents INTO THE WOODS -- Discussion — Page 35

Does Cinderella have pink streaks in her hair?

That is such a horribly lit/angled picture of Donna. She looks gorgeous on stage, not like the straight up tran these pictures show.

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Not gonna lie, she kinda looks like Terence Stamp from Priscilla in that picture. At least, from the boobs up.

I called her performance bland because I found it bland. And I explained in the most specific terms why I found it bland.

Disagree with me, by all means, but why suggest that I - and others who share my point of view - unfavorably respond to Adams because its hip to reinforce how wonderful Gleason was at Adams's expense?

This has nothing to do with comparing her to Gleason. I didn't mention Gleason in my post. If I had never seen Into the Woods before, I wouldn't like Adams's performance. The fact that I cherish the memory of Kim Crosby's Cinderella isn't keeping me from loving Jessie Mueller's.

i am not in the habit of perseverating an image of how a role should be played. I would venture to guess that few people love Alice Ripley's Diana Goodman more than I did. But that didn't stop me from equally praising Marin Mazzie's completely fresh portrayal of Diana.

Why can't we just disagree and discuss why we disagree about a performance? Why this need to dismiss someone who dislikes a performance you might like by psychoanalyzing the other as being hip, inauthentic. and unable to give up the ghost of Gleason?

Updated On: 8/8/12 at 08:06 PM

Those of you who have seen the show: how was Amy Adams' "What was that?" moment? That's the line right after her dalliance with the Prince and right before Moments in the Woods. You can literally judge an actress' entire performance in this role based on how she lands that simple line (no hyperbole).

I honestly can't remember how she read the line. Or much else about her performance, except that I found it uninspired and that she took every possible well-tread path. The fact that the actress playing the Baker's Wife, one of the most memorable, cherished, sought after roles in the Sondheim canon, made an unforgettable role fade to the background is extremely disappointing.

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Hoping for some great reviews tonight!!!

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I'm interested to what the critics think of the costumes since most people on here did not like them.

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jacobsnchz14, why are you so sure the critics will judge the show based on first previews, which they didn't see? Many productions with much discussed preview problems have received positive notices: Motherf**ker with the Hat, Titanic et al.

Part of me wonders if the open secret of The Public maneuvering so hard to try and move the show to Broadway before it even went into rehearsal may come back to bite them as far as the critics are concerned. Although this isn't on as grand of a scale as that, we certainly saw a similar situation when YOUNG FRANKENSTEIN established a high barometer of expectation in terms of ticket pricing before anyone had ever seen it, which caused a backlash in terms of how people perceived the show when they finally did come into New York.

Of course, at the end of the day, the quality of the show is the quality of the show, but if you see this production and are disappointed by it (as I was,) you can't help but cast a suspicious eye at The Public for having such lofty ambitions that, in hindsight, look a little greedy. And before anyone says that's the norm, name the last time they started raising money for a commercial transfer before a show had opened (the Al Pacino-led THE MERCHANT OF VENICE doesn't count, since Jeffrey Richards was the one who brought the idea of doing it to The Public himself.)

It goes back to that Reidel piece questioning the priorities of Oskar Eustis (who I happen to love,) which I know is a conversation many in the theatrical community are engaging in.

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Updated On: 8/9/12 at 09:48 AM

I've heard a recording of the show and I wasn't really that impressed by it. Granted, seeing it in person with everyone's facial expressions and body language helps, but it didn't sound like the audience was enjoying it as much as they should have.

A lot of lines that always get laughs (even in that truly terrible revival) didn't get so much as a chuckle. Are they supposed to be playing the entire show as straight as humanly possible or something? Is this part of the concept?

I'm not gonna judge the show until I can actually SEE it played out, but what I heard certainly didn't do much for me.

Caught last night's final preview performance before tonight's opening. Some quick thoughts:

- Gorgeous set. Very clever and visually stunning. Loved the beanstalk.

- Amy Adams can sing most of the notes beautifully (not so much the higher ones), but she lacks almost all comedic timing. Maybe I'm just spoiled by having watched Joanna Gleeson so many times, but I would guesstimate that more than half of the jokes I expected to get huge laughs just didn't land. (Also, in regards to an earlier post, her "What was that?" didn't get much of a laugh.) I thought she made a nice effort, but she looked scared to death the entire time.

- Denis O'Hare just can't sing this show. I was a little embarrassed for him. "No More" and "No One Is Alone" were almost painful to listen to, not just because they strayed off-key but because he wavers and is so blatantly uncomfortable when he's singing. I felt like the audience was giving him pity applause.

- Also on the subject of O'Hare, I felt he was miscast, which became especially apparent when the cast is whittled down to the quartet at the end. O'Hare is 50 going on 60, and with Jessie Mueller looking exceptionally young (she's a little more than half of O'Hare's age), it seemed less like the Baker and Cinderella were the mother/father figures to Jack/Red, and more like the Baker was the father figure to all three. Very odd age dynamic between the four of them.

- THE GIANT. Oh my gosh. I was smiling from ear to ear the second that scene started. Really, really brilliant, and a really lovely Act Two surprise.

- Donna Murphy's Witch was completely forgettable; that is to say, this is not a performance that anyone will be talking about in a few years. Her rap wasn't very good. It seemed to me that she tried so hard NOT to be Bernadette that she ended up missing some good comic opportunities/punchlines. Her second act was far superior. Her highlight: she acted the crap out of "Last Midnight." Her lowlight: that costume was just bizarre, and the transformation was really underwhelming.

- Jessie Mueller was fabulous, as expected, although her timing on the Cinderella pratfalls never got a laugh.

- I thought the Narrator was adorable, well-executed and well-used. The big reveal was clever, and worked well.

- Sarah Stiles absolutely stole the show.

- Gideon Glick has a gorgeous voice, but he will never not seem aloof... even by Jack standards.

- Ellen Harvey got almost no laughs, which is surprising, because I thought her Stepmother was excellent.

- There were far more line flubs than I expected. Some just seemed lazy. At one point, Donna said, "It's your father's fault that the place got cursed and the place got cursed in the first place." Yes, it's Sondheim, yes, it's challenging, but if middle schoolers can do it, so can you.

- The presence of the dead parents at the end was really memorable. This production really hits hard at the children/parent motifs. For all the flaws of the production, I managed to walk away from the theatre with something new in mind, which is really the mark of any successful production.

Updated On: 8/9/12 at 10:34 AM

"It seemed to me that she tried so hard NOT to be Bernadette that she ended up missing some good comic opportunities/punchlines."

I found this to be one of the major problems with the 2002 revival. They tried so hard not to be the original that it seemed as if they were breezing through what had been funny lines in order to downplay the humor in them, while trying to create funny lines where they hadn't existed before. I can see that to some extent, the comedy can come from how it's played and you can often find ways to bring humor to lines that don't intrinsically contain humor. But these plays are written with humor and tone built into them. To constantly fight against the tonal structure of a play seems unwise to me.

This is a particular danger for a show as well known as ITW. People will be expecting a certain line to land. Then when it doesn't, it feels like a failed dud that brings you out of the moment while you think of how they missed another laugh.

I haven't seen this production yet. So my comments are general, not specific to the direction or performances at the Delacort.

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Updated On: 8/9/12 at 11:02 AM