Peter Pan

Over the past few months, I have been doing theater as my afternoon activity at school, which cumulated in three different performances last weekend. The cast and crew had been preparing to perform the play Peter Pan and I am very glad to say that the performances were very successful.
In the play, I played Michael Darling. He is Wendy's youngest brother who goes to Neverland and becomes an honorary Lost Boy there. It was very interesting and different to play him, because he is a five year old boy from the Victorian age, which I have little personal experience anyway. After some trouble with acting out this character, I used my particular set of skills to my benefit and created him into a whiny and slightly annoying little boy.
My hard work, just like my fellow cast and crew mates, paid off a lot in the end. We, as a whole group, clearly had chemistry on stage and off that made the play, which put an important emphasis on the relationships between the fictional characters. We also became able to work together very well, which was shown by the success of the scene changes that were implemented shortly before the actual production.
It also showed in the success in each of the shows. There were no real problems that occurred at any of the performances. This is very unusual, as there usually is at least one night of every show I have been in where something goes majorly wrong. This happened in Kiss Me Kate, as almost the entire cast was sick for all three performances. It also happened in Bone Chiller, where during one of the performances, most of the cast forgot their lines in the third act and we had to improvise the majority of the act. We also had very good audiences that were very enthusiastic and invested in the play. There also was either a full or almost full house every night.
We also did extremely well in the area of creating an new interpretation based more on the original play, instead of the Disney film of Peter Pan. Our play used the interpretation that Neverland and all the characters from the island were created in Wendy's imagination. This was very important in our play, as it had a big impact on several different areas of the play. The sets from both the nursery and Neverland were very similar, to show that she took inspiration from her real life. The costuming also reflected this as well, as Captain Hook was the only character from Neverland wore shoes, as Wendy's imagination only fully completed Captain Hook's character, as he was the villain in the world and based on her mother's character. It also was reflected in casting as several characters played two roles, one from Neverland and another from the real world, to show how Wendy got he inspiration to create the characters she did create.  
After the success of Peter Pan, I am even more excited for the next production that I get to be in. We are putting on the musical Once on This Island and I will be in the ensemble. I can hardly wait till rehearsals begin after Thanksgiving break.


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