Peter Pan

This Piers Chater-Robinson version of Peter Pan in three acts was the perfect vehicle for the youth section of Murton Theatre Group to display their talents, and display them they did with lots of enthusiasm.

The show opened in the nursery of the Darling family where we met the Darling children played by Amelia Lambert as Wendy, Luke Clark as John and Harris Miller as Michael. The three worked really well together and gave super performances. Amelia as Wendy had a beautiful singing voice and oozed confidence. Katrina Wake as their mother gave a good performance and also had a lovely singing voice. On the night I attended Sophie Edmundson-Kelly was Nana the dog (Maysie Surtees on alternative performances) and she gave her character lots of life especially when being scolded by the long suffering housekeeper well played by Lucy Blyth. We were also introduced to the angry and impatient Mr Darling played by Nick Thompson, he was the perfect contrast to the rest of the family and relished in the opportunity to later portray Mr Darling’s alter ego Captain Hook with gusto and good vocals, and his costume was also very good. Of course no nursery scene would be complete without the appearance of the show’s namesake, Peter Pan, ably played by Grace Fitzakerly who gave a confident performance throughout with good singing and portrayed a lovely friendship with Wendy, their duets were delightful.

In act 2 the children arrived in Neverland and were met by the lost boys who were a mix of colourful characters led by Emily Bell as Tootles, Keira Feeney as Nibs, Erin Usher as Curly and Josie Littlewood as Slightly all very well portrayed; all of their individual characters shone through and the twins played by Molly Coulson and Archie Parry were especially cute. In Neverland we also met the dastardly pirates, the young people in this group thoroughly enjoying their opportunity to be the baddies of the piece. As Smee, Hook’s sidekick, Sam J Scott looked great, gave a super performance with good characterisation and together with the other pirates Bill (Brendan Atkins), Starkey (Lily Dixon), Cookson (Lillie Canning) and Mullins (Faye Stewart) gave great support to Hook. Tiger Lily was very well portrayed by Evie Miller, her hand and arm gestures narrating her words were so slick. Joshua Baker as the Chief also gave an assured performance and the entire tribe of natives were excellent in their war dance.

Act 3 brought us the defeat of Hook and it was clear to see that the “fighting” had been carefully rehearsed and supervised and was well put together.  

The entire young cast worked hard to portray their characters and combined with good singing throughout, colourful costumes and good props put together a thoroughly enjoyable performance, congratulations to everyone involved.

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