Reviews 2010
Reviews 2010
✭✭✭✭✩
written by J. M. Barrie, directed by Tim Carroll
Stratford Festival, Avon Theatre, Stratford
June 12-October 31, 2010
“The Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up”
Stratford’s first-ever production of “Peter Pan” is a wonderful show and great fun for the whole family. This is the kind of show Stratford has been seeking for years having tried a long series of misguided adaptations of 19th-century novels that reached its nadir in 2003 with “The Hunchback of Notre Dame”. J.M. Barrie’s “Peter Pan” (1904) was written from the start with goal of appealing to both adults and children and has remained the most successful example of this genre ever since.
The Shaw Festival has been identified with the play since its magnificent production of 1987, revived in 1988, directed by Ian Judge in designed by Cameron Porteous. In 2001 Christopher Newton staged a new version at the Shaw that aimed to undercover the darker aspects of the story, of which there are many, that was fascinating but less well received. Stratford’s current production directed by Tim Carroll is closest to the pure fun of the Shaw’s first production. Carolyn M. Smith’s designs, though enjoyable, do not eclipse those of Porteous in invention, but will certainly impress all first-time viewers of the play.
Carroll has altered the play by creating a frame in which J.M. Barrie himself (Tom McCamus) is seated stage left and reads the story to us which comes to life on stage. Between scenes he discusses the book and on one occasion gives the audience the chance to vote on what episode of the many in the story they wish to see on stage. At the conclusion he discusses the various endings he had given his story in its various versions and then introduces what he claims is his favourite version. This is, however, not the version that ends Barrie’s original play called “Peter and Wendy” in which Peter returns to lead Wendy’s daughter Jane off to Neverland and suggests that the Darlings will be involved in an unending cycle of visitations. Rather Peter appears only to find the Darling children are no longer there. The play closes with a tableau of Barrie and Peter staring at each other through the Darling family’s window.
Carroll’s frame, drawn from the play’s stage directions and from Barrie’s story that preceded the play, will please adults with its metatheatricality, but it is unnecessary and it does negatively affect the traditional doubling in the play that gives the story an important psychological dimension. Usually, as in the Shaw’s two productions, the actor who plays the Darling children’s father also plays Captain Hook while the children’s mother plays the Indian princess Tiger Lily whose life Peter saves. The traditional doubling not only brings out the Oedipal aspects of the story but fulfills Bruno Bettelheim’s view of children’s stories as a means children use for coping with the all-powerful adults who control them. Instead, Carroll has Barrie the author double as Hook and Barrie’s maid Lily (Martha Farrell) double at Tiger Lily. This doubling removes an important element from the story and shifts the focus away from the Darling household and onto Barrie himself as if demonstrating the thesis of the film “Finding Neverland” (2004) were more important.
This intrusion aside, the play is well cast, well acted and well directed. Tom McCamus, who played the role of Peter Pan at the Shaw in 1987 and 1988, is now Barrie and Hook. He captures the twinkling wryness of the storyteller and pitches Hook’s zestfully swaggering pomposity, as it should be, halfway between menace and comedy. Michael Therriault gives a very physical performance as Peter, viewing every object he encounters as a plaything. He is all breathless boyishness, immune from deeper thoughts. As a result his famous statement, “To die will be an awfully big adventure” doesn’t quite ring with all the implications it could have.
Sara Topham is an ideal Wendy, full of excitement as herself but fussy and authoritative when she has to be “mother” to the Lost Boys. Paul Dunn is excellent as the bookish John as is Stacie Steadman as irrepressible Michael. Laura Condlln gives a sensitive portrait of Mrs. Darling, the most mature character in the play, while Sanjay Talwar is a comical Mr. Darling. Jay T. Schramek, hidden in his dog costume as Nana, is also very funny.
Among the Lost Boys, Shane Carty as Slightly and Ari Weinberg as Tootles make the biggest impression while among the pirates Oliver Becker stands out as a frightening Gentleman Starkey. Comedian Seán Cullen may play the larger role of Smee but does nothing with it. Martha Farrell provides fun as Barrie’s maid Lily who literally enters into his fictional world. Brigit Wilson cackles her lines as the Darlings‘ maid Liza to such an extent we expect she’ll be exposed as a witch.
The play has many highlights. There is the wonderfully imagined scene where the Darling children learn to fly, their many failed attempts only making their success more exhilarating; the absolutely thrilling appearance of the pirate ship, designed by Leslie Frankish, as it glides through the mist to fill the stage; and the kidnapping of the Lost Boys who are then carried through the theatre and into the balcony where they are hurled down to Smee on stage who tries to catch them. Certain effects could also be improved. Sean Nieuwenhuis’s projection of Tinker Bell looks more like an hourglass than a fairy, making the Barrie’s original idea of a single point of light still win out as more effective. Carolyn M. Smith’s design for the Lost Boys’ underground hideaway cannot complete with Cameron Porteous’ marvelous full-length, bi-level set that revealed the boys living among tree roots beneath with full surface landscape on top. Our first glimpse of Neverland includes a dinosaur which immediately creates the wrong impression and should be excised. This is not Jurassic Park.
Nevertheless, the Avon Theatre has not seen a show filled with so much fun and so much spectacle since the great Gilbert and Sullivan series by Brian Macdonald and Susan Benson in the 1980s. Unlike so many plays pitched at families, Barrie’s “Peter Pan” is also a great play that works both as an exciting adventure and as an examination of the nature of childhood and adulthood. This is the perfect play to see with a group mixing old and young since youth and age are what it is all about.
©Christopher Hoile
Note: This review is a Stage Door exclusive.
Photo: Tom McCamus. ©David Hou.
2010-07-19
Peter Pan