Hadiyyah Noelle Smith (Photo by Brayden Hade)
Reviewed by F. Kathleen Foley
Wisteria Theater
Thru Sept. 28
RECOMMENDED
I have attended several productions of Into the Woods over the decades, in venues both large and small.
However, the current production at the Wisteria Theater in North Hollywood may be one of the most purely innovative I’ve seen.
I first saw the show in the cavernous Ahmanson Theatre on its first tour. The production featured Bernadette Peters and Tony-winner Joanna Gleason — both sublime, to be sure. Yet I’ve always felt that the show worked best in a small space, with the action more close-up and personal, rather like a child’s bedtime story. After all, while the musical is based on a combination of familiar fairy tales, composer Stephen Sondheim and librettist James Lapine weren’t interested in sunny childhood escapism. They went for the down-and-dirty real stuff — gory cautionary fables of foreboding and warning, straight out of Grimm.
And when it comes to bedtime stories, the Wisteria’s show takes us right into a child’s bedroom—a young latchkey kid (precociously talented 5th grader Hannah Rubinstein), who has been left alone while her mother is working late. As the lonely girl, (who also functions as the piece’s narrator) plays with her toys, we are drawn into her solitary childhood fantasies.
It’s an unusual start but it works beautifully. And that is only the beginning of director/designer Brayden Hade’s “reinterpretations.”
Perhaps most striking are the AI-generated rear projections that function as the various sets and more. Of course, there are legitimate concerns about AI’s incursion into theater and the possible displacement of stage artists. However, certain intervals that proved problematic in previous stagings are more successfully addressed here. Instead of her placement in a rickety treetop, Cinderella’s mother (Annie Claire Hudson) is entirely animated, much like a singing avatar. And again, it works beautifully, as do the cartoon birds who fly down to help Cinderella prepare for the ball and later peck out her evil stepsisters’ eyes. All animated. All AI. All amazing.
It’s not all techno razzle-dazzle, though. Staging a musical this long and complicated is challenging, but Hade sturdily structures the mechanism with few creaking nuts and bolts. There are a few botched laugh lines that required more comical finesse, and the Wolf (Cameron Parker, later superb as Cinderella’s Prince), sometimes opts for volume over suavity. But overall, those minor blips don’t detract from the pure pleasure of the evening.
A solid cast, buoyed by Nolan Monsibay’s musical direction and Madison Mi Hwa Oliver’s simple but effective choreography, bring their own brand of brio to the mix. Alexa Rosengaus is particularly poignant as Cinderella, one of the few survivors of the Giantess’s rampage, while Carter Haugen and Renee Wylder, as the Baker and his Wife, project the touching intimacy of a long-married couple who may have their differences but are still very much in love.
Hade has helmed almost a half-dozen musicals since the Wisteria first opened in 2022. I had never been to this theater before, and am now wondering how on earth this handsomely appointed facility, this terrific company, and this genuinely original director has escaped my notice thus far. I won’t let them fly under my radar again.
Wisteria Theater, 7061 Vineland Ave., N. Hollywood. Fri.-Sat., 8 p.m.; Sun., 3 p.m., thru Sept. 28. www.wisteriatheater.com/upcomingshows 3 hours with intermission.
