Stage Write

Fairytales are familiar fare at Beef & Boards Dinner Theatre, but the darker stories in Into the Woods are not. The theatre is currently producing the Stephen Sondheim musical for the first time. The show explores the lives of Cinderella, Little Red Ridinghood, Rapunzel, etc. with a much more realistic twist. What happens after the happily ever after ?  Don Farrell and Meaghan Sands play the baker and his wife. The pair is the heart of the show. Their struggle with infidelity drives them into the woods to break a curse. The two work well as a married couple, frustrated with each other and loving in equal measure. Sands is particularly good, providing a grounded center in the midst of chaos. Her vocals are beautiful. Farrell finds his voice during the number “No More”. “Agony” sung by Cinderella’s Prince (Timothy Ford), and Rapunzel’s Prince (Mickey Rafalski), is one of the highlights of the show. For me it blends the production’s tongue-in-cheek humor, excellent singi...

South Pacific is a musical that’s been around long enough for most people to already know whether or not they love it. Beef & Boards Dinner Theatre’s latest production of the show hasn’t changed much since its last turn on the stage almost ten years ago. Deb Wims reprises her role as the naïve nurse from Arkansas, Jeff Stockberger is back as Luther Billis, and Cynthia Thomas returns as Bloody Mary. Lt. Joseph Cable and E mile de Becque are played by newcomers to Beef & Boards, Mickey Rafalski and Robert Wilde respectively. Both were excellent, and Rafalski’s voice brought a particularly beauty to numbers like “Younger Than Springtime”. There’s not much time to see the romances develop throughout the show. From the opening scene we learn that Nellie and a Frenchman, Emile de Becque, have met and fallen in love. Later Lt. Joseph Cable falls for a local Polynesian girl, Liat, in a matter of moments. It’s hard to root for relationships that seem to develop so sudden...