PETER/WENDY
West Coast Premiere
Adapted and Directed by Jeremy Bloom
from J.M. Barrie’s “Peter and Wendy” and “The Little White Bird”
Featuring: Terry Bamberger (Hook, Mr. Darling), Sam Bertkin (Peter), Anya Kazimierski (Tinkerbell), Jessica Rudholm (The Tiger Lilly), Kim Saunders (Smee, Mrs. Darling), Jeunee Simon (A Lost Boy / A Mermaid), and Elissa Beth Stebbins (Wendy).
Dates:
Opening/ Press Night Nov 19 8pm
Preview Nov 15-16 8pm, Nov 17 7pm
Thus-Sat 8pm; Sun 7pm Nov 21-Dec 15
Tickets $15-$33 at Custom Made’s online box office A new bare-bones, modern adaptation that will make you fly!
Mary Zimmerman (Metamorphosis, The Arabian Nights) protégé, NY based director Jeremy Blooms brings his heartfelt, and sorrowful, PETER/WENDY to Custom Made’s 15th anniversary season. In recreating J.M. Barie’s Peter and Wendy for our times, Bloom transforms the uniquely hallowed cathedral space of The Gough Street Playhouse into the world of Never-Never Land, as his seven pajama-clad performers fly, dance, and move around the space in perfect sync.
Bloom explains his Peter/Wendy, saying “it’s not some new crazy adaptation, but the story stripped down to its bare element. The book was intended to be read aloud to children, but it was also written and continuously rewritten by a person in a state of perpetual loss. All of the characters are fiercely grown up enough to have ideas about death and to be exhilarated by good storytelling.”
Bloom has reversed the usual “Peter Pan” image by having six women portray all the characters in the book, including Hook, Smee, and Mr. Darling, while the only male in the cast portrays Peter. Bloom uses “happy thoughts” from the audience each night, as well as passers-by on the street, to create the pixie dust needed to make Peter/Wendy fly. He then employs his unique bare-bones, “image-staging” which involves the use of hand-held lights, the simplest of sets, and narrative movement to retell the tale of the one boy who never grew up, inspired by the dark and delightful words of its creater, J.M. Barrie. Peter/Wendy is intended for adults of all ages, and children above the age of 12.
Critics on Peter/Wendy
“It takes a certain kind of magic to make [this] happen and the man behind the curtain who we should be paying attention to is a young theatrical alchemist by the name of Jeremy Bloom” – broadwayworld.com
“Peter/Wendy does a remarkable job of creating its atmosphere with the barest-bones of tools: no theatrical lighting, only table lamps and garden floodlights; all the performers in pajamas; a few pieces of fabric, two chairs, and a slatted window blind for a set. Its commitment to the purest elements of theatre is refreshing, and commendable.” – nytheatre.com
“Walt Whitman’s been waiting a hundred years in his grave for this.” – Mary Zimmerman on Jeremy Bloom’s adaptation of Leaves of Grass
