When Stephen Sondheim's "Into the Woods" was announced as part of the great Shakespeare in the Park series for this summer (July 23rd- Aug 25th), I felt like living happily ever after. It's such a great show and seeing it outdoors may well feel like how it was always meant to be seen. With the recent announcement that Amy Adams would be playing the Baker's Wife (a wonderful part) it occurred to me ~ this won't be the first time she's sung in Central Park.
Lately Shakespeare in the Park has been easing up a bit on the star casting preferring midlevel stars or stage talent or one big name but the casting of Adams may signal a change. My friend Tom at the Broadway Blog got me way too excited about what might follow with this little bit (after the jump).
Oscar-nominee Amy Adams will be The Baker’s Wife in this summer’s Shakespeare in the Park production of Into the Woods. No word yet on the rest of the leads but if this is the first announcement (and it’s pretty great casting, even if she strikes me more as a Cinderella), one has to imagine there are even bigger names to come. The mind boggles…Meryl as the Witch?
I'd previously heard rumors that the witch might be Donna Murphy which would be wondrous, too. I hadn't even considered Meryl. I'm biting my nails now. Who? Who?
The cast list now stands like so unless I've missed an announcement...
Left to Right (from top): Jack, Cinderella, Cinderella's Prince, Rapunzel, Rapunzel's Prince, Cinderella's Mother
The Witch: TBA
The Baker: TBA
The Baker's Wife: Amy Adams
Narrator: Jack Broderick
Cinderella: Jessie Mueller
Little Red Riding Hood: TBA
Jack: Gideon Glick
Rapunzel: Tess Soltau
Rapunzel's Prince: Cooper Grodin
Cinderella's Prince: Ivan Hernandez
Granny: Tina Johnson
Steward: Josh Lamon
Cinderella's Mother: Laura Shoop
Related: Cast This - Into the Woods .Bonus points to TFE reader Andrew K who was the first to suggest Amy Adams for this role when we were doing imaginary casting for the Rob Marshall film version in January.