Based on the Miramax motion picture by David Magee and the play The Man Who Was Peter Pan by Allan Knee, Finding Neverland follows the relationship between playwright J. M. Barrie and the family that inspired Peter Pan, or The Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up, one of the most beloved stories of all time.
Final Broadway performance August 21.
Finding Neverland purports to be historical: the true tale of how Barrie, inspired by his dealings with the family of Sylvia Llewelyn Davies, created the boy who wouldn't grow up. It also purports to be a singing-dancing family entertainment. It winds up being neither...What's accurate -- perhaps the only thing -- is that Barrie acknowledged the Davies brood as his muses for Peter Pan...On this slender foundation Finding Neverland...builds an enormous superstructure of trite psychology...Finding Neverland demonstrates about as much insight into creativity borne of loss as a Facebook memorial candle. Even if everything in it were profound and true, it would still be a mess, suffering as it does from confusion (or willfulness) about what makes a musical a musical. In good ones, songs are not decorations applied interchangeably to the exterior of a story, like gift-wrap. They are the gift. Here, they seem to be recycled from a different package entirely...More attention has been lavished on the show's tricks than its logic.
For a show about releasing the imagination, the musical is surprisingly conventional -- a down-the-middle family entertainment with excellent actors...as well as sturdy storytelling that recreates the movie with dogged fidelity...the production has a low-wattage wow factor that...mostly misses the chance to transform the fantasies in Barrie's mind with 21st century magic...Morrison -- a major Broadway talent before the world knew him as Mr. Schue from 'Glee' -- has a beard and a three-piece suit and an endearing playfulness as yet-another sensitive father figure...Grammer gets all the best lines and delightfully makes the most of them...Designer Scott Pask's fantasy scenes -- except for a beautiful sparkly death scene for a beloved parent -- have an intentional homemade quality, while Mia Michaels' peculiar choreography traps high society in grotesque jerky cavorting. Brit pop composers Gary Barlow and Eliot Kennedy offer serviceable songs with elementary structures and rhymes we can sing before we hear them.
2015 | Broadway |
Original Broadway Production Broadway |
2016 | US Tour |
First US National Tour US Tour |
Year | Ceremony | Category | Nominee |
---|---|---|---|
2015 | BroadwayWorld Awards | Best Leading Actor in a Musical | Matthew Morrison |
2015 | BroadwayWorld Awards | Best Lighting Design | Kenneth Posner |
2015 | BroadwayWorld Awards | Best Orchestrations | Simon Hale |
2015 | BroadwayWorld Awards | Best Scenic Design | Scott Pask |
2015 | BroadwayWorld Awards | Best Score | Gary Barlow |
2015 | BroadwayWorld Awards | Best Sound Design of a Musical | Jonathan Deans |
2015 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Actor in a Musical | Matthew Morrison |
2015 | Drama Desk Awards | Outstanding Featured Actress in a Musical | Carolee Carmello |
2015 | Drama League Awards | Distinguished Performance Award | Kelsey Grammer |
2015 | Drama League Awards | Distinguished Performance Award | Matthew Morrison |
2015 | Drama League Awards | Outstanding Production of a Broadway or Off-Broadway Musical | Finding Neverland |
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