Skip to main content
Campus Community

Debut Director’s Dream Come True

The Winter 2017 musical of “Into the Woods” sponsored by the English & Theater Department premiers this week.  This is the first production with new head of theater Kristl Densley, replacing the retired Dr. Craig Ferre. Before coming to BYU-Hawaii, Kristl Densley taught theatre and acting at Penn State and Indiana University. She has directed musicals, plays, and operas. Densley herself is a theatre practitioner and an actor.

The English Circle and Honor Society offers refreshments on the first night’s showing at their pre-play event in McKay 101 across from the auditorium. Student Josh Mason, music major and former President of Honors Society, is invited to conduct a pre-play discussion.

The plot of “Into the Woods” revisits and rewrites many classic stories like Little Red Riding Hood, Cinderella, Jack and the Beanstalk, amongst others weaving them into a single conglomerate. The musical deals with many classic fairy tale motif themes including dream fulfillment or lack of due to moral ambivalence, especially among the portrayed family relationships of spousal, parental, and filial duty.

This musical production credits the work by Stephen Sondheim who wrote the original music and lyrics. The music is composed to allow performances to follow the natural speech rhythms in the spoken song lyrics bringing out thought-process narrative in the music.   

The Disney film adaptation directed by Rob Marshall and starring Meryl Streep, Emily Blunt, Johnny Depp, and many stars was released in 2014. Since the Disney adaptation is perhaps the most familiar to most audience members, the production and cast have epic roles to fill. Densley compliments her cast saying, “The cast has put in so much work.  They have trusted my concept and my guidance and I could not be more proud of what we have accomplished together." Densley feels especially proud to see her students from the classroom to the stage as "the epitome of awesome."

Approaching her new role with creative enthusiasm, Densely notes her perspective of the direction she takes: “My style of theatre/directing is new. I am very much interested in not showing all my cards to the audience. I want them to meet me half way in the imaginary world of the play. In fact, I often give them a clue and allow their imaginations to fill in the gap. That is what interests me as a theatre artist. That is what makes theatre different than film; I am not giving you all the answers.”

The show begins Thursday, January 26, 2017, through Saturday, January 28, 2017.  The musical plans to go from 7:30 PM - 10:30 PM in McKay Auditorium on the BYU-Hawaii campus.  They ask no food and beverages brought into theatre.

To watch a trailer of BYUH’s "Into the Woods," click here.

Into the Woods Play.jpg