The Walnut Street Theater Production Of Peter Pan Invites You To "The Land Where Dreams Are Born"

Theater: Walnut Street Theater
Show Title: Peter Pan
Opened: November 20, 2007
Seen: December 2, 2007
Reviewer: Arnie Finkel
Submitted: December 3, 2007

First star on the right and straight on ‘til morning—that’s the address of Neverland, the magical destination for all of us who "won’t grow up". Over 100 years ago J. M. Barrie created Peter Pan for children of all ages. When I decided to review the current Walnut Street Theater production, I wanted to see it through the eyes of my 9 year old granddaughter Rachel. The following is her review (with my comments in parenthesis)

I liked the show from the first time I saw the curtain that showed the places I would see later. Then they used Tinkerbell to show us where we were going to be.(Tinkerbell was a lighting effect—a part of the very effective design by Paul Black)

Then I saw the Darling (the family’s name not a comment) nursery. It was like a regular house and then the rest of the scenery was really like what Neverland should be like. (Thanks to a superior set design by Robert Andrew Kovach)

The Actor who played Peter(Cary Michele Miller) had a terrific voice. And I liked that Nana the dog was played by a person(Joey Abramowicz). I loved it when Peter and the Darling Children(Kristen Paulicelli as Wendy, Griffin Back as John and Conner O’Brien as Michael) were flying. I could see the wires but it was still magic. I couldn’t believe that Peter could move around so easily when she was connected to the wire.

The songs were much better than the ones in the movie (Music by Philly’s own Moose, or Mark as the program says, Charlap, lyrics by Carolyn Leigh-additional music by Jules Stein with lyrics by Comden and Green) I thought everyone had a good voice and the orchestra wasn’t too loud.(kudos to Douglas Lutz for musical and vocal direction)

I liked the Lost Boys and Tiger Lily(The incredibly flexible Toni Elizabeth White) and the Indians and especially the pirates. They were really funny. Like the one who died for so long and then fell off the ship (the always reliable and talented Jeffrey Coon) and Smee (a nicely nuanced performance by Michael Daly).

Besides Peter and Wendy, my favorite character was Captain Hook. He was supposed to be the bad guy but he was really funny. He had to have music when he thought of all the bad things he could do.(A finely balanced, just right on the line of overplaying and not over it, performance with a great big voice by Paul Schoeffler).

My favorite part was the clapping dance to Ugg-a-wugg/pow wow by the Indians and the Lost Boys. The best was the Indian who did the gymnastics. (Rachel has a Junior Black Belt in Karate and studies dance-so she knows what she’s talking about). It was awesome! (The dances and musical staging and indeed all the pace of the production were in the capable hands of Marc Robin who did a spectacular job.)

So you can see I really loved seeing Peter Pan on stage and I think everyone would like it. (And, after all, isn’t that what live theater is all about.)

(Peter Pan plays at the Walnut Street Theater until January 6, 2008)

THANKS

Arnie (and Rachel)