15. Peter Pan (with Kate Herzlin)

This week, we welcome Kate Herzlin to discuss 1954's Peter Pan, directed by Jerome Robbins, and written by Mark "Moose" Charlap, Carolyn Leigh, Jule Styne, and Betty Comden & Adolph Green. Mary Martin played the role for years, followed by Cathy Rigby, and both produced celebrated televised versions. You might also remember the recent televised version with Allison Williams and Christopher Walken.

Kate wrote the book of a new musical version of Peter Pan, and she talks with us about the history of the character, and we all discuss what this show did for children's musicals and TV musicals, while also discussing whether or not it's actually a good show.

Trigger warning for a discussion of possible pedophilia near the end of the podcast. Once Jeremy begins talking about The Little White Bird, which is the J.M. Barrie story for which he invented the character of Peter Pan, you might want to skip the rest of the episode if you don't want to hear a quotation from the book which does not quite sit right to modern ears.

You can read about Kate's version of Peter Pan (which won Best New Work in the 2016 Philadelphia Broadway World awards) here: https://www.broadwayworld.com/philadelphia/article/Media-Theatre-Presents-New-Modern-PETER-PAN-AND-WENDY-Musical-20160117 And if you would like to hear more about this version of Peter Pan for your school or theatre, you can reach Kate here: kateherzlin@gmail.com

Here is the link to the NYTimes article about 2014 Peter Pan that we talk about in the show: https://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/12/06/arts/television/nbcs-peter-pan-live-starring-allison-williams-and-christopher-walken.html?referer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2F