The characters may be familiar, but this isn’t your typical fairy tale.
This year’s Bethlehem High School musical is “Into the Woods,” a longtime favorite of director James Yeara, and one he is producing for the third time. The story is a re-imagining of several tales from the Grimm Brothers that begins innocently enough but soon interweaves the lives of several classic characters.
“The tales themselves are really old, but they are becoming popular again because they hit at the core values of our lives,” said Yeara.
Created by Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine, the show originally opened on Broadway in 1987. It has recently had a reemergence with its 2010 London revival and a new film in the works to begin shooting in October and said to star Meryl Streep.
Yeara said fairy tales continue to entertain, and the proof is in recent popular Hollywood revitalizations like “Jack the Giant Killer,” “Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters” and television shows like ABC’s “Once Upon a Time” and NBC’s “Grimm.”
“The stories have always been there, and they are now in our DNA,” said Yeara. “They’ve been used as inspiration by Russian composers and French philosophers, and we always reinterpret them to fit our own rules.”
To prepare, the cast and crew read a different Grimm tale before each practice and discussed it. Many of the storieshad nothing to do with the play, but Yeara said it helped the actors better understand the world they were about to become a part of.
The story begins with the standard fairy tale situation of a couple turning to their local witch for a potion in order to conceive a child. Eventually, Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Rapunzel and Jack all work together to help the couple find the ingredients needed for the potion.
Senior Alisa White, who plays Cinderella, said the story is more fast-paced and exciting then some may expect.
“This is about being careful what you wish for; I think that’s the moral,” she said. “Every different character has their own moral, but that’s the overall one. As people, we are constantly wishing for things, but we need to be accepting of what we have.”
Eventually the story morphs into something new, and unlike most fairy tales, not all of the characters have a happy ending.
Yeara warns that some of the characters do die, and the story may not be for younger audiences.
“It’s a bit morbid and graphic, but this also isn’t “The Walking Dead,” said Yeara.
The production will rely heavily on the special effects created by student lighting and sound designer Chris Uhl. The sets were designed by Bill Morrison. The production has a cast of 30 and a crew of 20, with music and choreography by Jason and Lindsay Dashew.
White said she finds her character of Cinderella very relatable. As a high school student, she still isn’t sure what she wants out of life, and she feels the thinks the young princess would feel the same way about the prince pursuing her.
“It’s been a good experience just to be able to use my own life just to put into the character,” she said.
“Into the Woods” runs April 11, 12 and 13 at 7 p.m. and April 14 at 2 p.m. in the BCHS auditorium. Tickets are $10 adults and $8 for seniors, students and veterans. Visit www.stage700.org for more details.