What’s the cost of childhood fame? Is it always exploitative? How do children navigate being adults in a world that refuses to see them as anything but the child they were? These are the themes of John Logan’s Peter & Alice. Alex Gomez directs the production now playing in Napa at the Lucky Penny Community Arts Center through Feb. 15.
The stellar script begins at the opening of the 1932 Lewis Carroll exhibition in London. It is a fictionalized version of a real meeting between Alice Liddell Hargreaves (Bright Eastman) and Peter Llewelyn Davies (Max Geide). If those names don’t ring a bell, the books written about them will.
Alice Hargreaves was Carroll’s (Dennis O’Brien) inspiration for Alice in Wonderland (Pilar Gonzales). Peter Davies was J.M. Barrie’s (Kade Morrill) inspiration for Peter Pan (an excellent Arthur Mautner). Slipping between memory, fantasy and their current reality, this is a heartbreaking but fascinating look at what it means to grow up.
While the cast as a whole was good (with a special shoutout to utility actor Scott Schwerdtfeger for portraying three diverse and profoundly tragic bit roles), it was Morrill’s Barrie that stole the show. Their deeply reflective portrayal of the enigmatic author brought a layer of grounded reality and maturity that made Barrie a sympathetic character, even as we are asked to question the true nature of his relationship with the Davies boys, and his emotional complicity in Michael Barrie’s death.
The production values were also great, notably the set by Barry Martin, which, due to some whimsical stage magic, becomes a character itself, and the costumes by Barbara McFadden.
Although the show has some blocking and pacing issues, of greater impact is the insertion of an intermission into the otherwise 90-minute play, a growing trend in theater. While there are always reasons for this choice, in this instance it completely undercut the power and emotion of the preceding scene, leaving what immediately followed the nearly impossible task of rebuilding the moment. This isn’t to say the show didn’t recover, but it did dampen the power of what immediately followed.
Even with the aforementioned issues, this is a show not to be missed. This script is so tight and these actors are so earnest that one might leave with some tears, but one will also leave smiling.
‘Peter and Alice’ runs through Feb. 15 at the Lucky Penny Community Arts Center, 1758 Industrial Way, Napa. Thurs–Sat, 7:30pm; Sun, 2pm. $30–$40. 707.266.6305. luckypennynapa.com.
