Charming, poignant ‘Finding Neverland’ grows up
The score is lacking, but the staging sings
NEW YORK Before landing on Broadway, the new musical Finding Neverland went through cast changes and an overhaul of the creative team. The high profile of lead producer Harvey Weinstein made these and other developments subjects of breathless speculation. The show itself, based on the film and Allan Knee’s play The
Man Who Was Peter Pan, probably will cause less of a stir. The production, which opened Wednesday, is directed by Diane Paulus, whose exhilarating revivals of Hair and Pippin have been high points of recent seasons. Here, unfortunately, Paulus is saddled with a lackluster score by pop veterans Gary Barlow and Eliot Kennedy, who provide mostly syrupy ballads and vaguely peppy production numbers.
The book, by rising playwright James Graham, is better — hokey at points, but offering enough playful wit and compassion to make this story about the creation of Peter Pan fly. The creator himself, J.M. Barrie, emerges as a less elusive figure than he did in Johnny Depp’s screen portrayal.
Glee alum Matthew Morrison — appearing in his first Broadway production since 2008’s glorious staging of South Pacific — is predictably likable and credible as a man who rediscovers the boy inside himself.
The family that inspires Barrie — widow Sylvia Llewelyn Davies and her four sons— is again central. The romantic attraction between the doomed Sylvia, played by a graceful and unsentimental Laura Michelle Kelly, and Barrie is more prominent in this telling, and the boys come across more as evolving human beings than cute props.
At a recent preview, Aidan Gemme and Alex Dreier — among several young actors rotating in the four roles — were particularly moving as, respectively, Peter and elder sibling Michael. Both characters seem genuinely adoring and protective of their mother, and Gemme convincingly shows us how Peter’s skepticism toward Barrie turns into affection and trust. His moments with Morrison are some of the truest and most poignant in the show.
There are more cartoonish antics, some courtesy of Kelsey Grammer, clearly enjoying the expanded role of Barrie’s producer, Charles Frohman. In addition to serving some of Graham’s more pungent lines, Grammer gets to transform into a swashbuckling Captain Hook for one of several scenes that plumb Barrie’s imagination. Peter Pan pops up in the lissome presence of Melanie Moore.
Special effects are on hand, as you might expect, to make these sequences more vivid. Various designers acknowledged in the playbill include an “air sculptor,” Daniel Wurtzel; and Scott Pask’s set offers dazzling colors and fanciful shapes. In the end, though, this Never
land is most charming in subdued moments, when the emphasis is on human connection and, eventually, loss. There are subjects that everyone must confront, whether we choose to grow up or not.