“On the Steps of the Palace” is one of my all time favorite songs by Stephen Sondheim. It showcases everything he is brilliant at. The wit. The rhymes. The rhythm. The neurosis. It is a stream of consciousness song at its finest. Since it was announced Anna Kendrick was cast as Cinderella in Into the Woods, one of the things I have been looking forward to most is hearing her perform that song. Well, with just a few weeks until the movie opens, we get a chance to hear her sing that song… and it is pretty awesome.
First off, I believe it is in a slightly higher key than originally written. Usually a change in key bothers me to no end, but here not so much. It mainly doesn’t bother me because it is a higher key. A lot of times in movie musicals they lower all the keys because they hire performers who cannot hit the notes (*cough* *cough* Madonna in Evita *cough* *cough*). Kendrick, though, has got some serious pipes on her, so why not take it up a step?
I was a little worried she would be making a beltier Cinderella, which she does, but it did not rub the wrong way as I thought it would. Sopranos are getting shoved out of the musical world, and it would have been nice to have a true soprano sound for Cinderella. But Kendrick makes it work. And I love me some belting.
Something that was a little jarring was placing the song in the present tense. In the show, the song occurs after she has given up her shoe on the palace steps. Here, she is on them. For a film translation, that makes a lot of sense to me. Active voice and not passive.
You guys, I do not think you understand how much I want to see this film. You can get all excited for your Marvel movies or Star Wars. Give me some beautifully sung Sondheim over a lush orchestra!
Take a listen to Kendrick’s performance below, and you can pre-order the soundtrack here.
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