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The Pitch

The official student newspaper of Walter Johnson High School

The Pitch

The official student newspaper of Walter Johnson High School

The Pitch

Out of Character and “Into the Woods”

I enjoy plays and musicals, so naturally I was intrigued when I discovered WJ S*T*A*G*E was performing “Into the Woods” for their spring production. After seeing last year’s production of “Les Miserables” (“Les Mis”) the year before and the hilarious production of “Noises Off,” I figured this play wouldn’t be a disappointment. I was right.

“Into the Woods” is a musical that takes a lot of the classic fairy tales, like Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood and Jack and the Beanstalk, and combines them into one mash up where all the characters live together in a kingdom. The twist is that instead of everyone living happily ever after, “Into the Woods” reveals what life would be like AFTER the “original” endings, which presents each character with blame, death and a giant avenging her husband’s death.

Like most fairy tales, the play has a narrator (Coty Novak and Eliana Papanicolau DC) who tells the story to the audience. The central story revolves around the Baker (Joe Kappeler and Matt Khor DC)  and his wife (Defne Dilsiz and Emma Higgins US) on their journey to break a spell which had hindered their ability to have a child. To do so, the witch (Lital Firestone and  Yuval Luger US), who lives next door, tells them all the items they will need, being “the cow as white as milk, the cape as red as blood, the hair as yellow as corn, and the slipper as pure as gold,” to collect as they head into the woods. Along the way, they have a run-in with a bunch of other classic characters, such as Rapunzel (Rebecca Gillman and Megan Flaherty US), who coincidentally have the items they are trying to find. They also have a run in with a new character that hasn’t been featured in classic fairy tales, the Mysterious Man (Bradley Stein and Jordan Rodriguez US), who causes some mischief as well.

The one thing that stood out, however, is how each character had a distinct personality. This is different from the classic heroic main character in Disney fairy tales. For example, Jack (Josh Beede and Ben Simon US) isn’t just curious, he really is dumb, and the princes aren’t everyone’s dream, they have flaws like all people, such as arrogance. With that in mind, the actors really captured the audience and made them really understand how normal, for lack of a better term, these people actually are even though they are fairy tale characters.

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After the Baker and his wife collect all the items, everyone else lives happily ever after as well, which ends the first act. So Cinderella (Felice Amsellem and Ivanna Barrientos US) gets her prince (Michael Rosenberg and Steven Gondre-Lewis US), Rapunzel is rescued by her prince (Hideyuki Miyoshi and Steven Gondre-Lewis US), Jack  isn’t killed by the Giant (Emma Higgins and Yuval Luger DC) and Little Red Riding Hood (Amanda Ting and Margot Cohen US) is saved from the wolf (Charlie Rubinovitz and Anders Norberg US).

The second act, however, turns sinister, as every action which led to their happily ever after comes back to haunt them. Without giving too much away, the characters’ lives take a dangerous turn.

In terms of performance, it was no “Les Mis.” The show can’t be blamed for that though, because “Les Mis”  is more demanding. It has a much more relatable and in depth plot as well as a classic story. However, “Into the Woods” takes classic childhood stories and presents them in such a way that makes people look at those stories in a different light. The cast definitely did a great job. I only went to see opening night so I do not know how the double cast performed in comparison, but from what I saw, everyone hit their marks, the singing was phenomenal, and the actors were so in tune with their characters that people could feel the sadness after each death except the narrator’s.

The amazing part is during the play, the actors wind up standing still for a good chunk of it. At the beginning, everyone is in little boxes and the audience sees what their life is like before entering the woods. If one is not performing, they must be absolutely still, as if someone closed the pages of their book. Standing still for even a minute on stage is extremely difficult, and some of the performers did it for five or more minutes at a time.

All in all, I was extremely satisfied with the performance of this cast and crew and cannot wait until their fall production. If you did get to see it, I’m sure you’ll agree it was a great production.

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About the Contributor
Izzy Salant, Print News Editor
Junior Isaac Salant, known as Izzy, is excited to be on his second year of Pitch staff. He is the Print News Editor after being the Print Assistant News Editor & Online News Co-Editor last year. He has had a passion for journalism for a while and has a journalism background as his father is a reporter for Bloomberg News. Aside from The Pitch, Izzy likes baseball and acting, takes Tae Kwon Do and is involved with Live at WJ, where he performs comedy and magic. Additionally, Izzy hopes to be a part of WJ S*T*A*G*E, and is an anchor on The Daily Lineup, where he is frequently known to mess up.
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