Neil Patrick Harris, Heather Headley and Sara Bareilles Star in ‘Into the Woods’ at New York City Center

variety.com:

Michael Appler Three or four times a year, something special happens in New York City: A rare opportunity—and precious luxury in theater these days—to pay $35 for the hottest ticket in town (if you can get one).

The bill is “Encores!,” New York City Center’s yearly programming of musical theater.Once an obscure incubator to resurrect little known or passed-over productions—the current Broadway revival of “Chicago,” which has run for 25 years, began as an “Encores!” show in 1996— New York City Center’s two-week only productions are now a staple of New York theater, sought after for their pared-down musicals packed with big stars.On Wednesday evening, “Encores!” opened its final show for the 2021-2022 season: Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s “Into The Woods,” directed by Lear deBessonet and starring Neil Patrick Harris, Sara Bareilles, Heather Headley, Denée Benton and Gavin Creel.“When they call you, you come,” Headley, who stars as the Witch, told Variety after the opening performance on Wednesday. “You do your best to get here, because it’s such a special theater.”“I did ‘Encores!’ before I did ‘Aida,’” she added. “I did ‘Do Re Mi’ here, and everybody said I had no choice but to come. ‘Aida’ followed soon after.”Each “Encores!” production—offered as a concert-style performance for cost, though you’d never know, save the scripts actors are legally mandated to carry onstage—lasts for two short weeks.

Rehearsal, a secretive process, begins just two weeks before.“It’s like a bullet train, and you’re trying to stand up and not be hurdled off the bridge,” Harris, who plays the Baker, described to Variety. “There is so much nuance in Sondheim’s work, and people spend an undue amount of time parsing and imagining it.