We just closed this show on Saturday. It was so much fun, but it was the most difficult play I have ever directed.
Simply to answer your questions, we stole one thing, and that was the look of Mr. Grin. It was two roped with white flags to make the top and bottom of the mouth with teach, and we used to red eyes. We found old round trays or decorative pieces and painted them red. We cut the teeth out of printer paper and taped them to a couple of pieces of rope. I liked the image from the Broadway production. But our Mr. Grin wasn't quite right.
And that is why I am responding. I really liked the rest of our show, but it was a leap of faith. I deliberately decided to ignore the original production. I have a great book/script from Broadway that has lots of pictures. I didn't open it once.
Instead, we read the script and discussed the meaning of the play, the connections to Peter Pan, and the style of the Broadway show. That took a few hours. Then I sent the kids to our props/set storage/costume room. They brought anything that could be useful. Anything that was too real or too modern we didn't use. It was boxes, canes, a small broom, a couple of ropes, a few parasols, a barrel, some broken crates, old suitcases, a walking stick, etc. I then had the kids figure out their original position on stage.
After that ... we started blocking. I didn't have anything written down. We just used what we had to tell the story. I still had to make two trunks "indentical in their trunkness," a kitchen timer, find a laser pointer (tink - but I think I would do it differently), and a british flag.
It was so scary to tell the story with our found items, but it worked SO well. I had no idea what was going to happen. We would get to something challenging, like the cat, and I wouldn't know what to do. But I would look around the set, and I would see a cast member to use or one of the items the kids had found. It was just right. I constantly had to fight the urge to buy things. Two weekends ago, I went to the Renaissance Festival. There were so many great things I could have bought: clothes, swords, etc. But I kept resisting. Peter and the Starcatcher is more about the troupe of actors telling the story. They can find and producing anything you need with their creativity ... and yours.
My kids thought I was crazy. Blocking took forever. But once we rehearsed it this way, the kids knew how to solve any problems. Like this one:
We made Black Stache's hand out of masking tape. It is a project you can find on the internet. One night of the show, the trunk he was supposed to open to cut off his hand was locked. The cast had left the key off stage at intermission. All 12 cast members were onstage. There was no way to get the key to them. The trunk was clearly locked so they couldn't cut off his hand ... and Stache couldn't even look in the trunk to see if it was empty. He grabbed a staff and used it to pretend it was the lid of the trunk. It worked great. He slammed the staff on the trunk like it was being closed, and the scene went on ... "sans" hand. But then the real challenge came. Smee couldn't retrieve his fake hand. The actor playing Fighting Prawn, put his own hand on the floor behind the trunk. He tapped Smee and pointed to it. Smee picked it up and continued the scene holding "Stache's hand," which was actually the actor playing Frighting Prawn. It was hysterical. And it was right in line with the structure we had rehearsed. After that performance, we kept the hand bit. But we made sure the trunk never locked again.
So .... I don't think you need all the answers. Let the kids find them. It will be funnier. And ultimately, I think it makes the acting more honest.
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David Tate Hastings
Kansas Thespians
Co-Chapter Director
thespis@kansasthespians.com913-481-1868
Original Message:
Sent: 09-11-2016 20:59
From: Jennifer Jordan
Subject: Peter And The Starcatcher
Hello All!
I am directing Peter and have limited time to do it justice. I love this kind of style/devised theater feel and am looking forward to our second rehearsal tomorrow. Has anyone done this one before? I am specifically wondering how many actors were used for each scene/grouping. Also, I would love to hear any creative ideas for creating Mr. Grin, the bird, Tinkerbell, cat, etc. I thought I would go for a puppet type of thing.
Thanks!