DramaLit Blog 1.0: BU School of Theatre

This show sounds really exciting to me, and I wanted to share it with you guys.

Peter and the Star Catcher has its Broadway premier at The Brooks Atkinson Theatre next month. It is a prequel to J.M. Barrie’s novel “Peter and Wendy,” and tells the story of how Peter met Captain Hook and became Peter Pan.

The show was developed by Disney Theatrical Productions and had an Off-Broadway run at New York Theatre Workshop in the Spring of 2011. The Off-Broadway run starred Christian Borle as Black Stache (the Captain Hook Character), and Adam Chanler-Berat as Peter.

Peter and the Star Catcher will perform at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre, with previews beginning on March 28. Borle is not likely to return due to his commitments to the new show “Smash,” but Chanler Berat will be returning to his role.

This is the part that sounds exciting to me, the production has 12 actors playing over 50 roles. The actors create the world of the play together, with minimal props- including a rope and a ladder, in a sort of story theatre style.

This feels like a new kind of theatre for Broadway. It is not billed as a musical, but has more than a few musical numbers. From the clips I’ve seen, the staging and story telling are very imaginative, and not what you usually see on a Broadway stage.

This play has all the excitement and imagination of a big musical, but in my opinion, feels more artistic and creative. I think this show has the components to be a really great production- great creative team, talented actors, a classic and well written story, and most importantly, exciting story telling.

I might have to make a trip down to NYC to see this show in March, who wants to join me? We can hit up Matilda too!

I also found this fun video on how the poster was made- John W. Long is cool old dude working as a woodworker in Vermont. He is a self-described “artist in wood.” Very cool guy!