A modern perspective on what happens after ‘happily ever after’

By Peter Alexander Feb. 14 at 3:15 p.m.

“Anything can happen in the woods,” Stephen Sondheim wrote.

That lyric tells one premise of Sondheim’s modern fairy-tale musical Into the Woods, which will be performed by the University of Colorado Department of Theatre and Dance over two weekends, Feb. 22–March 3. Theatre professor Bud Coleman directs the production, and CU alumnus Adam Ewing conducts the freelance orchestra.

In addition to all the magical things that can happen in the woods, another premise of the show is the question, just what happens after “happily ever after”? To answer that question, Sondheim and book author James Lapine imagine some very familiar fairy-tale characters all together in a single story. Each of the characters has a backstory before the fairy tale begins, and each one faces the unintended consequences of their wishes.

“You’re going to see Cinderella and her step-sisters, Jack [from] Jack and the Beanstalk, Little Red Riding Hood, but Sondheim and Lapine take their story past the traditional Grimm fairy tale,” Coleman says. “We’ll actually find out one version of what might have happened to them after they get their wish.”

Read more in Boulder Weekly.

# # # # #

Into the Woods
By Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine
CU Department of Theatre and Dance

7:30 p.m. Friday & Saturday, Feb. 22 & 23
2 p.m. Sunday, Feb. 24
7:30 p.m. Wednesday–Saturday, Feb. 27–March 2
2 p.m. Sunday, March 3
University Theatre

Tickets

Based on classic fairy tales, Into the Woods contains multiple acts of thievery, murder, accidental death, amputation, infidelity, kidnapping, family arguments, and child neglect.