Faith, Trust, and Pixie Dust: Reviewing PETER PAN LIVE

Photo Description: Kaitlyn at 5 years old dressed as Peter Pan
with a plush Brown Bear dressed as Tinkerbell.

I admit it. I was skeptical when NBC announced that they'd do PETER PAN as this year's holiday musical after the "success" of last year's SOUND OF MUSIC. The definition of success is relative, depending on who one asks. With PETER PAN, I was nervous what they would do with one of my favorite stories of all time.
It's not just about how well one hides the wires, let alone fly with them, or how lavish the sets are - it's how the whole production carries out while staying true to Mr. Barrie's masterpiece.

Growing older, I was attracted to the boy who wouldn't grow up. While my friends and classmates paraded around in Disney princess dresses or superhero costumes, I would don on my homemade green tunic, brown belt, and green hat with a red feather and pretend to fly. My faithful bear joined on our adventures as Tinkerbell. Three Halloweens in a row, I dressed as Peter - and not only on that particular holiday. There's a picture of me in costume sitting on Santa's lap.

I had the original 1904 play as well as the 1911 book, not to mention multiple incarnations of the story on VHS and DVD - from the telecasts of Mary Martin and Cathy Rigby to the feature films of HOOK and the 2003 PETER PAN as well as the 1953 Disney Classic Masterpiece version. To round out that collection, I had books on piracy and had my own bottle of Pixie Dust. In short, I lived and breathed the story of PETER PAN and refused to grow up. Nowadays I tell people that I am "growing older, but not up". There's a difference.

Now, with the NBC telecast, I watched the performance with an open mind - knowing that whatever they do, it wouldn't measure up to the greatness of Cathy Rigby or Robin Williams - but knowing that whatever happens, I would enjoy the show nonetheless for the story itself. I did have some misgivings about the casting of Christopher Walken as Capt. James Hook - but I wanted to give him a chance.

The performance opened with the nursery scene - a delightful design and I loved the Christmas touches - the tree in the hallway, the stockings on the fireplace mantle - and approved of the window in which my friend would enter. Rest assured that some of the cast were veteran Broadway performers who could handle "live" gigs, I kept on watching. (I did avoid the Twitter banter at this point).

Historically, the role of Peter is played by a female. There are multiple reasons for this - the voice, the lighter weight and build, easier to fly, more believable as a 'boy', etc. I was pleased that the telecast followed this tradition with casting Allison. Had they cast a male, my trust in the production would have dropped a few notches. However, the role of Mr. Darling did not follow tradition - usually, the actor playing Mr. Darling plays the role of Captain Hook to suggest parallelisms between the two characters. Instead, Mr. Darling plays Smee. I could go with this adjustment as I fell in love with the character of Smee, brilliantly portrayed by Broadway veteran Christian Borle.

About halfway through the three-hour special, curiosity got the better of me and I checked out Twitter to see what was streaming under #PeterPanLive . Many of the tweets were highly entertaining, especially when read in time to the scene presently playing on screen.

There was one moment in particular when tradition met technology. In the story, Peter asks the audience to clap in order to save Tink. During older telecasts, this was an one-sided action - how would Peter know the audience was clapping if she-as-he couldn't see them? The original version of the story was written for the theater, where the actors could see the audience and act upon their response - hopefully clapping furiously to save our little friend. The Disney version skipped over this moment entirely while the 2003 live action turned to cutting across scenes of sleeping children chanting "I do believe in fairies! I do! I do!"

This time around, when Peter asked us to clap, a line of text scrolled over the screen, asking us to Tweet #saveTinkerbell. I checked Twitter (and contributed my own #saveTinkerbell tweet) and sure enough, half were tweeting #saveTinkerbell while the other half tweeted #pray4Tink. Thus, the fourth wall broke down and followed tradition in a unconventional manner. Yes, it's Twitter, and yes it can be a bit gimmicky, but the idea of the audience responding via social media is something new, and something to be explored in future telecasts. I would take tweeting to save Tinkerbell any day over Peter not getting any response from the audience whatsoever

The performances by Mrs Darling, Nana, Smee, Michael, and the crocodile were my favorites. Christopher Walken as Captain Hook came off as Captain Hook playing Christopher Walken - but in a way  that came off as likable Allison as Peter came off strong and full of energy, and thank god, she could handle the wires just fine.

Yes, the wires were visible, but being part of the audience means one needs to suspend any shreds of disbelief for three hours and see through the wires to the magic surrounding the wires.

Neverland - while it was not the Neverland I pictured, I still enjoyed the whimsical quality it had. Silly, but in a childlike way - which is how one might portray Neverland as seen from a child's perspective. Like Mr. Barrie stated in the opening chapters of the book, everyone perceives Neverland in their own way. No two Neverlands are the same. They all share similar facets - an island, different adventure zones, a lagoon, a pirate ship - but the overall shape and size of Neverland appears customized to the individual. That is how I could buy this version of Neverland - it is someone else's perspective of an ideal paradise.

In short, I enjoyed the performance for what it shared - a  fun three hour escape into the playful story of Peter, full of vibrant colors and energy-inducing dancing with plenty of smiles and chuckles throughout. It also offered the audience to connect through watching the same TV special and interacting with each other through social media, something that wouldn't have been possible in the telecasts of the 1950s. It was also a big improvement over last year's SOUND OF MUSIC. Yes there were some slack moments and some cringe-inducing seconds as well as some questionable actions - but then it's live. It's meant to reflect the live magic of theater where anything can happen (and will happen). We're all together for this ride - or flight - through childhood through the magic of PETER PAN.

I applaud the cast and the crew for a production well done.