Sondheim, Bernadette Peters going into ‘Woods’ again in one-nighter

Here’s catnip for musical theater lovers who are into “Into the Woods” in specific and Stephen Sondheim in general.

Composer Sondheim, original star Bernadette Peters and James Lapine, who wrote the book and directed the first production of the fractured fairytale, will be onstage together Nov. 9 at the Segerstrom Center for the Arts in Costa Mesa, in an evening of talk and song celebrating “Into the Woods.”

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FOR THE RECORD

An earlier version of this post incorrectly gave the date of the “Into the Woods” event as Nov. 11.

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Billed as a “live documentary ... production,” it will intersperse a panel discussion with songs sung by Peters, who played the witch, and six other members from the original 1987 Broadway cast -- Joanna Gleason and Chip Zien (the baker’s wife and the baker), Ben Wright (Jack, the beanstalk climber), Kim Crosby (Cinderella), Robert Westenberg (Cinderella’s prince and the wolf) and Danielle Ferland (Little Red Riding Hood).

Eileen Roberts, a Los Angeles writer and producer, is organizing the event at the 3,000-seat Segerstrom Hall. The Segerstrom Center’s announcement says it’s “a one-night-only reunion celebration” of “Into the Woods.” Tickets won’t go on sale until Sept. 21.

Sondheim and Lapine’s acerbic take on classic fairy tales will reach the big screen Dec. 25, in a Disney film adaptation directed by Rob Marshall, with Meryl Streep as the witch, Johnny Depp as the wolf, Chris Pine as Cinderella’s prince and Emily Blunt as the baker’s wife.

Also on the menu this season is a production of “Into the Woods” originated by the Oregon Shakespeare Festival that pulls into the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts in Beverly Hills for a Dec. 2-21 run. The Old Globe in San Diego recently presented a summer outdoor staging of “Into the Woods,” in a version created by New York’s Fiasco Theater. It marked the show’s return to the scene of its 1986 premiere in a shakedown run before it reached Broadway.

For trivia buffs, erstwhile rocker Ellen Foley was the first to play the witch, earning good notices at the Old Globe while warming up the part for Peters.

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