Out of the Woods

As you have seen before, my friends, Into the Woods is a favorite for me.

But Sondheim is hard; all those key changes and tempo changes and whatnot, and it's long as well. Two and a half hours (plus intermission) is a very long play.

But they aced it.

There were a few little problems here and there; these are very young performers for a play such as this, the piano was too loud during one performance, a spotlight did not work properly on the last show. Two casts, as is often the case at our favorite children's theater. But this time, instead of doubling the same play with the same director, there were two very different casts with two directors. One of them was the 15-19 year old kids, and one was the 12-16 year old kids. Abby was in the latter.

And she was playing the adult, and hamming up her role in a big way. You see, she was Jack's Mother (Jack of beanstalk fame), and he is "a foolish child," so she is constantly... oh, it is too long. Suffice it to say, for those of you unfamiliar with the story, they've taken the stories of Rapunzel, Cinderella, Jack and the Beanstalk, and Little Red Riding Hood, added music, and mixed well.

Abby, as Jack's mom, played the Anger Born of Worry and My Beloved Smother tropes to the hilt. He loves her to the point where he's willing to kill to avenge her death, and she loves him enough to stand up to a giant (with "forty-foot feet") to protect him. She has the hand-wringing of an exasperated parent down to an art form all its own (I wonder where she learned that one), and there are a couple of her lines that she delivers in ways that make me literally laugh out loud every single time (though I saw this production four times, and I've lost track of how many times of other productions).

In any case, they rocked it, and it was over far too soon in some ways (and not soon enough in others; I'm looking forward to a stretch of two or three months without rehearsals for the one or cookie sales for the other).

As for Lizzy, she is getting to know herself and how to self-regulate more each day. After the final performance of the play, at ten-thirty PM, she decided the lobby was too packed full of noisy people (it was a sold out show) and retreated into the theater. When asked if she was okay, she said (somewhat sarcastically), "I'm only sensory seeking until I'm overtired. Then I'm sensory avoidant."

All righty then.

Children will listen, after all.