REVIEW BY JESSICA FANWONG
EDITED BY RACHEL THORNBY
Into the Woods has been among the most popular musicals to be remounted in recent years. With any show that is restaged so often and features storylines most audiences grew up listening to as kids, the challenge is to retell the classic with a new twist. Needless to say, I had high expectations going into this production. However, the University of Melbourne Musical Theatre Association (UMMTA) has proved that there is always a way to add new flavour to an old, timeless tale, while remaining faithful to the familiar story.
Directed by Alex Fallshaw, UMMTA’s 2025 mainstage production, Into the Woods, is a conglomeration of fairytales. There are three central threads: Cinderella, the Baker and his Wife, and Jack and the Beanstalk. Other characters interweave through the central stories, such as Rapunzel and Red Riding Hood, alongside the Witch as a key driver of the multiple plotlines. The story focuses on the moment of call to action, when fairytale characters embark on their heroes’ journeys by entering the woods. Within the woods, the characters go through a series of character transformations, learning complex life lessons that go beyond the simplistic happy endings of children’s fairytales.
Fallshaw did a commendable job revitalising the story to a contemporary audience, accompanied by the strong music direction of Mia Mazzarella. The stellar cast members embodied the characters very well. As with non-professional student theatre, the vocal strength of the cast is unfortunately varied, but it did not detract from the strong performance of the larger show. Highlights include Charlotte Nolan (the Bakers Wife) and Eleni Gerostamoulous (Cinderella), who had truly powerhouse voices. Gerostamoulous’ ‘No One is Alone’ was a personal favourite, performed with so much prowess and emotion.
Nolan and Matthew Packham’s Baker had a lovely dynamic that was enjoyable to witness and Pacey Dunshea portrayed the lovable, quirky Jack, bringing out quite a few endearing laughs from the audience. Jessica Harrison-O’Toole also performed fabulously, seamlessly switching between The Witch and Cinderella’s Mother. Harrison-O’Toole had a strong stage presence for The Witch, though I would have liked to see more distinct use of physicality between the pre-spell crone and post-spell cold-beauty enchantress. A similar comment can be made of Maxine Yu’s Grandmother, whose youthful energy came across as a bit too strong.
There were moments where I did feel the directions tended to mellow down the story. The more harrowing moments of the show, such as the deaths of the Baker’s Wife, the Witch and Jack’s Mother, seemed to be glossed over a bit too lightly. The missing squelch and visible fear when Baker’s Wife died, and the Witch’s sudden disappearance without depiction of punishment from her mother, toned down the darker aspects of the show. The Giant, too, came across as more comedic than a real threat. Some of the choices felt more appropriate for a younger audience, but for university-aged audience members, I wished the musical leaned a bit more into the grimmer elements in act two, to contrast it more with the lightness of act one.
Fairytales and storytelling are the key themes of the musical, so what impressed me the most was how the set team visually brought the story world to life. Tim Augier and Charlene Yong have created one of the most innovative and detailed sets I have ever seen. Walking into the Union Theatre, the first thing you see on stage is three colour-coded pop-out storybooks, titled with the three central story threads.
These storybook covers were not only decorative but were also closable and featured flappable pages that got used for set changes. The colour palette also became the signature colours of the characters as the multiple stories intermixed, echoed by the lighting design by Darcy Hersbach. Behind the looming immensity of the giant books were even larger and taller paper trees that, on closer inspection, contained typed words that made up the lenticels.
Finally, on the side stage was the narrator’s corner, designed as a bookstore, that inhabited the liminal space between the audience and the main story. While I would have liked to see the storybooks used a bit more–I personally believed Rapunzel and Red Riding Hood are deserving of their own storybooks rather than acting as side-characters to the other three–the set was truly spectacular, and attention to detail across the entire show is truly masterful. Augier and Yong have set a new bar for student theatre.
Likewise, it would be remiss not to mention the costume design. Designing the wardrobe for such a large cast is certainly a feat, but the costume team of Ella Barret, Clara Verbeek and Ava Castellarin rose to the challenge of creating costumes that evoked each character’s unique personality, their social class and the aesthetics of each story. Cinderella’s stepsisters were skillfully stylised in the elaborate late 17th-century French fashion of Charles Perrault’s world, while Cinderella wore a more modern princess dress. Red Riding Hood had a gorgeous porcelain-doll-like, brilliant red dress and hood, enhanced by makeup through red blushed cheeks. Rapunzel was a personal favourite, styled like a pre-Raphaelite nymph that brings to mind Lord Tennyson’s ‘The Lady of Shalott’. Jack, Jack’s Mother, the Baker and Baker’s Wife, while garbed in less elaborate peasant outfits to display their lower social class, were still well-thought-out designs that evoked their personality.
UMMTA’s Into the Woods is a delightful retelling, creating an immersive experience that allows audiences to live the fairytales that we grew up with and feel nostalgic for our childhoods.
UMMTA’s Into The Woods played October 9th – 11th at the Union Theatre.
JESSICA FANWONG (she/her) is a Naarm/Melbourne based writer, theatremaker and creative arts enthusiast currently studying Masters in Arts and Cultural Management. Her work can be found on Farrago and the independent theatre scene.
RACHEL THORNBY is a media and communications and creative writing student currently studying in Melbourne.
The Dialog is supported by Union House Theatre.
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