Stepping Out

Richard Mayer/Special to the Town Crier
Los Altos Stage Company’s “Into the Woods” wraps up Sunday.

Los Altos Stage Company’s holiday-season musical “Into the Woods” is set to run through Sunday at Bus Barn Theater, 97 Hillview Ave.

What happens after “happily ever after?” Fractured fairy tales of a darker hue provide the context for “Into the Woods,” which deconstructs stories by the Brothers Grimm via “The Twilight Zone.” The main characters come from the classic fairy tales “Cinderella,” “Rapunzel,” “Jack and the Beanstalk” and “Little Red Riding Hood,” and are tied together by a more original story involving a baker and his wife and their quest to begin a family.

Kevin Berne/Special to the Town Crier
Max Tachis plays David in TheatreWorks Silicon Valley’s “The Santaland Diaries.”

TheatreWorks Silicon Valley’s production of “The Santaland Diaries” is slated to close Sunday at Foothill College.

Written by David Sedaris and adapted by Joe Mantello, “Santaland” is a comedy about an ill-equipped elf forced to confront child meltdowns, overbearing parents and complacent Santas.

Pear Theatre presents the Bay Area premiere of “A Conversation with Edith Head” through Sunday in Mountain View.

The play stars Susan Claassen, an LA Stage Alliance-nominated actress and New Times winner for best actress. Claassen and Paddy Calistro wrote the play, based on the book “Edith Head’s Hollywood.” Calistro co-authored Head’s authorized posthumous autobiography.

Bayer Ballet, a Mountain View-based non-profit ballet company, is scheduled to perform “The Snow Queen” this weekend at the Mountain Center for the Performing Arts, 500 Castro St.

In the holiday ballet, based on a Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale, a young boy’s best friend sets out to save him after being captured by the Snow Queen’s spell.

Kevin Berne/Special to the Town Crier
Max Tachis plays David in “The Santaland Diaries.”

TheatreWorks Silicon Valley has brought back “The Santaland Diaries,” which proved popular with audiences last year, for a three-week run set to end Dec. 23 at Foothill College.

Written by David Sedaris and adapted by Joe Mantello, “Santaland” is a comedy about an ill-equipped elf forced to confront child meltdowns, overbearing parents and complacent Santas.

Richard Mayer/Special to the Town Crier
Brigitte Losey plays Little Red Riding Hood and Steve Allhoff portrays Wolf in Los Altos Stage Company’s “Into the Woods.”

Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s Tony Award-winning musical “Into the Woods,” scheduled through Dec. 23 at Bus Barn Theater, reaches new heights of inventiveness thanks to the talents of Los Altos Stage Company.

Elements from classic children’s fairy tales like “Jack and the Beanstalk” are incorporated in the story. The dark tale is not necessarily child’s play, however, as it includes a curse (not the profane kind), a character’s going blind, death and other less lighthearted elements.