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Peter Pan Live!

Peter Pan Live! (2014)

December. 04,2014
|
5
|
NR
| Adventure Fantasy Music Family

Following in the footsteps of the phenomenally successful The Sound of Music LIVE! - which drew over 18 million viewers - comes this musical masterpiece that tells the beloved story of Peter Pan, the mischievous little boy who ran away to Neverland. Get ready for show-stopping stars, stunning costumes, extravagant sets and delightful music that will have everyone in your home singing along. From Executive Producers Craig Zadan and Neil Meron comes a soaring holiday event guaranteed to take viewers on a magical and musical journey to the second star to the right.

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Reviews

TumnusFalls
2014/12/04

We watched this with great expectation of a good to great show. How could it not be great? Christopher Walken as Hook. A live production! Christian Borle from SMASH. Kellie O'Hara. I was even interested in Allison Williams.But starting from the beginning it seemed as if it just didn't quite jell. "Peter Pan" didn't quite hit the mark when he shows up. Not bad. Just a bit too rushed or nervous sounding. The kids were fine, the mom and dad were fine.Then we get to Neverland, and "Hook" shows up. Or maybe, just walks on as if exerting energy in the part would be to go against the director's expressed wishes.I thought from the reviews that people were being unfair to Walken, but no, they were not unfair. Unfortunately, Walken pulled the whole show down. The pirates, for example, were campy and energetic and and clearly trying to have a good time. But Walken in the middle of them all? Scene after scene just sinks. It might be that he's tired, or that he doesn't care, or that he is just horribly miscast. Whatever the reason, he was completely wrong and spoiled the production. (Even the previews of the production show him as giving way less than 100% in rehearsal--which is disastrous for any production--a professional *must* be at 100% at *every* rehearsal and production.Other people were fine. I wasn't overly impressed with the choreography, but it was fine. The sets weren't distracting--it's a representation of a live show, and so the sets are larger than life like they would be for a Broadway show.I liked some of the new songs they inserted (one of them was from the 1954 production, if I understand correctly), and I thought the music was great--great production values.All in all, given anyone else as "Hook," this would have been a good-to-great production. Give a fantastic "Hook," it would have been fantastic.But with Walken, it was just a so-so production.Five stars. Good enough to maybe watch again with your kids or grandkids, but not something you'd watch again on your own.

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padrelaw
2014/12/05

I have watched this twice now (missed part of the original broadcast), the second time with local kids. They absolutely were enchanted. I really believe the problem so many reviewers are having (we can see the wires, why is a girl playing Peter, blah blah) is the reaching for an adult sense of cynicism.With the exception of an oddly-stone-faced Captain Hook (why not make him have an over-reaching evil expression?) I think the actors were very good, with some acquiring excellence. The sets were what they should be - obvious fantasies -- and the music, while mostly familiar, coupled with simple, easily-filmed choreography, was fun, especially "I Won't Grow Up." Could it have been better? Not with the film restrictions of a live broadcast. I would say this revealed and displayed convincingly the "innocence on the reluctant edge of adulthood."

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TheLittleSongbird
2014/12/06

Watching it with an open mind and without comparison to the Cathy Rigby and Mary Martin versions(both superior), Peter Pan Live is not quite as awful as it has been said to be, there were a few things that were good. But on the whole, Peter Pan Live never really got its feet of the ground, starting off just okay at best and getting worse the later it got.There were a few good performances, the two best ones being from Kelli O'Hara and Christian Borle. O'Hara is an incredibly touching Mrs. Darling and with its gentle, angelic quality and warm but not excessive vibrato has the best singing voice of the entire cast, so much so anybody would love for her to sing them to sleep. Borle's Smee is a riot and he looks like he is having a whale of a time and brings the most energy out of anybody involved(he is good as Mr Darling too though it was odd when you are so used to the dual role being Mr Darling and Hook). Singing-wise, he is close behind O'Hara, rich and characterful. Taylor Loudermann is rather mature for Wendy but has a very pleasant, sweet toned voice and comes across as compassionate and charming. The crocodile also looks great, Nana is very well-trained(her mannerisms done to perfection and providing some humour) and the pirates bring bucketfuls of liveliness to their scenes if a little too over-eager in places(though in honesty they were likely trying to compensate for Walken).Allison Williams doesn't come off entirely successfully as Peter. She tries her best and actually is youthful, has a pretty voice that is up to the challenges of the role(and the role is not easy at all) and has alluring smile and eyes, however she does come across as too gamine and nowhere near cocksure enough(not even in the Duel number), certainly not passing at all as a 12-year old or so boy. She doesn't look completely at ease with the wires either. Christopher Walken is a disaster, I do like Walken but he was completely wrong for Hook. He completely phones it in, looks as though he wandered on stage drunk and squints a lot as if trying to read the prompter, his dancing is also lazy(whereas the rest of the pirates showed great athleticism he was basically shuffling from one leg to another and his singing is constantly tired-sounding and underpowered). Never do you feel any kind of menace and when there was any humour with him it came across as unintentional, like his out of time tambourine playing and radio frequency-sounding last note in Tarantella. The Lost Boys would pass more for football hooligans and the Indians even when looking more like Hawaiians still look and act stereotypically. John and Michael are okay though their energy flounders later on, John baring a resemblance to Harry Potter is a tiny bit disconcerting, while Alanna Saunders is an alluring and athletic if too sexy Tiger Lily.Visually, the production didn't really appeal to me. There's a lot of detail evident in the sets, but the colours often do look too bright and gaudy, while the costumes are mixed, Peter's and Hook's are nice and traditional and Mrs Darling's is gorgeous, but Wendy's is rather low-cut, the Lost Boys' look way too small for them and the Indians' look like ones that would belong somewhere else other than Peter Pan. The camera work is shaky and over-reliant on panning and close-ups which completely betrays Williams' lack of boyish youthfulness and the wires are always too visible which takes away from the magic. The music and songs are wonderful and the orchestra do perform them well but they really needed much more energy and ensemble tightness than they had here, the early songs are not so bad but halfway through and onwards the pace slackens to the extent the production's almost lifeless.Staging-wise and pace-wise other than Walken this was where the production fell down most upon, though some may forgive how clumsy the wire work looked. The choreography is very lacking, especially with the pirates, sometimes out-of-sync and too simple, Tarantella was a train-wreck but at least had that clever touch with the trap door. The Indian dancing looked more like gyrating, which looked so misplaced. What was also lacking was chemistry between the performers, again the opening nursery scene was very well done, but Duel was let down hugely by a lack of tension and lack of chemistry between Peter and Hook(Peter and Wendy's chemistry wasn't completely believable either but that between him and Hook was the bigger let down). The climatic sword fight fares just as bad, children doing pretend sword-fighting in the school playground is less amateurish than what was choreographed here. The pacing sags badly halfway through and never recovers beyond that point, the story is a classic but with a lot of musical numbers and thin on story there was a very bloated and overlong feel with nowhere near enough magic.All in all, has its moments and not as entirely awful as all that but even when judged fairly and on its own in my opinion Peter Pan Live didn't pass with flying colours. 3/10 Bethany Cox

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mike48128
2014/12/07

Let's forget a moment about: the bad sound quality as the audio gain is turned up so high (in the nursery) that you can hear the ventilation fans. Shaky camera work and technical video flaws, especially in the opening nursery. Did it soar? Yes and no. Allison Williams was quite good but seemed "too tall" for the role. She mastered the art of "flight" and sang very well, but we saw the flying "rigs" far too often, on camera. Story changes? A few in 50+ years are expected. The maid's part is cut to nothing and her dance number in Neverland is missing. Good, colorful, sets, especially the "break-away" nursery. (In the 1960 version, the dance floors were all "studio white".) Good costumes, especially the "Lost Boys" who were wearing the clothes they fell out of the crib in and were much too small, on purpose. The "Indians" looked far too "Hawaiian" for my taste, but at least they were not "stereotypical" from the 1950's. The music was scored very well. The "Lost Boys" are too old and look like lost young men. Capt Hook's beard is "fuller" (and faker-looking) in the publicity pictures. Christopher Walken can dance but he sure can't sing. He looked tired. His performance was too "wooden" and I could write several pages about what's wrong about it. His pirate crew could dance and sing, and (literally) carried him along. A great ticking crocodile! I did not miss the "Mysterious Lady" song (too gay). "When I Went Home" was restored, and it has a haunting quality about it. In short, this remake showed much promise, but someone like the late great Robin Williams or even Steve Martin or Martin Short would have been far better, cast as "Capt. Hook". A "motion capture" version needs to be made, using these iconic songs.The 1960 Mary Martin "Producer's Showcase" broadcast (in "1955" it was not in color) was the best, and had the best "Capt. Hook" (Cyril Ritchard) as well. What made that version work was the charisma between Peter Pan and Hook. Both stars were outstanding. Those sets looked cheap as well. It's currently only available as a fuzzy 2nd generation "unofficial" Goodtimes (Universal) DVD. Even Cathy Rigby's later version is better, but she looks too old-in-the-face. I was disappointed and may not even buy this new version, although it might play better without 40+ minutes of commercials. Look for it, along with "Sound of Music Live" at Big Lots, at the $5 or less,dump bin, by next year.

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