Into the Woods is a musical with music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and book by James Lapine. The musical intertwines the plots of several Brothers Grimm and Charles Perrault fairy tales, exploring the consequences of the characters' wishes and quests. The main characters are taken from "Little Red Riding Hood", "Jack and the Beanstalk", "Rapunzel", and "Cinderella", as well as several others. The musical is tied together by a story involving a childless baker and his wife and their quest to begin a family, their interaction with a witch who has placed a curse on them, and their interaction with other storybook characters during their journey.
Musical theatre is a form of theatrical performance that combines songs, spoken dialogue, acting and dance. The story and emotional content of a musical – humor, pathos, love, anger – are communicated through the words, music, movement and technical aspects of the entertainment as an integrated whole. Although musical theatre overlaps with other theatrical forms like opera and dance, it may be distinguished by the equal importance given to the music as compared with the dialogue, movement and other elements. Since the early 20th century, musical theatre stage works have generally been called, simply, musicals.
Andrew Lloyd Webber, Baron Lloyd-Webber is an English composer and impresario of musical theatre. Several of his musicals have run for more than a decade both in the West End and on Broadway. He has composed 13 musicals, a song cycle, a set of variations, two film scores, and a Latin Requiem Mass. Several of his songs have been widely recorded and were hits outside of their parent musicals, notably "The Music of the Night" and "All I Ask of You" from The Phantom of the Opera, "I Don't Know How to Love Him" from Jesus Christ Superstar, "Don't Cry for Me, Argentina" from Evita, "Any Dream Will Do" from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, and "Memory" from Cats. In 2001 The New York Times referred to him as "the most commercially successful composer in history". Ranked the "fifth most powerful person in British culture" by The Daily Telegraph in 2008, the lyricist Don Black stated "Andrew more or less single-handedly reinvented the musical."
Victoria Wood, was an English comedian, actress, singer and songwriter, screenwriter, producer and director. Wood wrote and starred in dozens of sketches, plays, musicals, films and sitcoms over several decades, and her live comedy act was interspersed with her own compositions, which she performed on the piano. Much of her humour was grounded in everyday life and included references to quintessentially "British" activities, attitudes and products. She was noted for her skills in observing culture and in satirising social classes.
Dame Julia Mary Walters is an English actress and writer. She is the recipient of four BAFTA TV Awards, two BAFTA Film Awards, a BAFTA Fellowship, and a Golden Globe. She has been nominated twice for an Academy Award, in the categories of Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress.
The Palace Theatre is a West End theatre in the City of Westminster in London. Its red-brick facade dominates the west side of Cambridge Circus behind a small plaza near the intersection of Shaftesbury Avenue and Charing Cross Road. The Palace Theatre seats 1,400.
Dame Katherine Patricia Routledge, is an English actress and singer. She is best known for her role as Hyacinth Bucket in the BBC sitcom Keeping Up Appearances (1990–1995), for which she was nominated for the BAFTA TV Award for Best Light Entertainment Performance in 1992 and 1993. Her film appearances include To Sir, with Love (1967) and Don't Raise the Bridge, Lower the River (1968).
Sheridan Smith, OBE is an English actress and singer. She rose to fame playing a variety of characters on sitcoms such as The Royle Family (1999–2000), Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps (2001–09), Gavin & Stacey (2008–10), and Benidorm (2009). From 2009 to 2013, she played the role of Joey Ross in Jonathan Creek. She went on to receive critical acclaim for starring in a succession of television dramas, such as Mrs Biggs (2012), Cilla (2014), The C Word (2015), and The Moorside (2017). Her feature film credits include Tower Block, Quartet, and The Huntsman: Winter's War (2016).
Nigel Derek Harman is a British actor, best known for his role as Dennis Rickman in the BBC soap opera EastEnders. He has worked mostly in theatre, with the stage being described as his "first love". He starred in the final series of Hotel Babylon. In early 2013 he started filming for the fourth series of Downton Abbey, playing visiting valet, Mr Green. From 2013 until the series ended in 2017, he played the role of Bradley Dawson in Sky One's Mount Pleasant.
Ruth Madoc is a British actress and singer. She is best known for her role as Gladys Pugh in the 1980s BBC television comedy Hi-de-Hi!, for which she received a BAFTA TV award nomination for Best Light Entertainment Performance, and as Daffyd Thomas's mother in the second series of Little Britain.
The Finborough Theatre is a fifty-seat theatre in the West Brompton area of London under artistic directorship of Neil McPherson. The theatre presents new British writing, as well as UK and world premieres of new plays primarily from the English speaking world including North America, Canada, Ireland, and Scotland including work in the Scots language. The venue also presents music theatre, and rarely seen rediscovered 19th and 20th century plays.
Simon Russell Beale, CBE is an English actor, author and music historian.
Julia Kathleen Nancy McKenzie, is an English actress, singer, presenter, and theatre director widely regarded as one of the finest and most distinguished artists of the past fifty years. Also notable as one of the few British performers to merit the title of "Triple Threat", she has premièred leading roles written by both Sir Alan Ayckbourn and Stephen Sondheim. On television, she is known for her BAFTA Award nominated role as Hester Fields in the sitcom Fresh Fields (1984–86) and its sequel French Fields (1989–91), and as Miss Marple in Agatha Christie's Marple (2008–13).
Kerry Jane Ellis is an English actress and singer who is best known for her work in musical theatre and subsequent crossover into music. Born and raised in Suffolk, Ellis began performing at an early age before attending Laine Theatre Arts from the age of 16.
The Menier Chocolate Factory is a 180-seat off-West End theatre, which comprises a restaurant, bar and rehearsal rooms.
The Playhouse Theatre is a West End theatre in the City of Westminster, located in Northumberland Avenue, near Trafalgar Square. The Theatre was built by F. H. Fowler and Hill with a seating capacity of 1,200. It was rebuilt in 1907 and still retains its original substage machinery. Its current seating capacity is 786.
Hannah Waddingham is an English actress and singer, best known for her contribution to West End musical theatre, particularly her performances in the original London production of Spamalot, the 2010 Regent's Park revival of Into the Woods, and most recently, The Wizard of Oz. She has received three Olivier Award nominations for her work. She has also had a successful film and television career. In 2015 she joined the cast of the fifth season of the HBO series Game of Thrones as Septa Unella, as well as appearing in the 2012 feature film adaptation of Les Miserables and 2018 British psychological thriller Winter Ridge in a primary role.
Sandra Michaels is an English actress. Her first television role was in March 1957, playing Phyllis in the second BBC adaptation of The Railway Children. Later that year she appeared as Pamela Gwendolyn Stuart in The Adventures of Clint and Mac, a British-made serial commissioned by Walt Disney Studios for The Mickey Mouse Club. Also in 1957 she played Caroline, a modern teenager who got up to mischief in the ITV sitcom The Thompsons.
The Ideal Gnome Expedition is a British musical play, with book, music and lyrics by children's playwright David Wood. It was first staged in 1980, and has since been adapted as a TV series and staged by several companies, including amateur groups. It tells of the adventures of a pair of garden gnomes who decided to take a vacation and set out looking for a sunny island.
