Peter Pan
Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre
2018

Stagecraft
There were any number of wonderful theatrical moments in the production of the play that was recently revived in London. Some of these are down to the playwright and his dramatic skill, others to the creativity of director, Ian Rickson, and Mark Rylance as Rooster. Our first introduction to Rooster, for example, is explosive. He appears out of his caravan bare chested, wearing a helmet and goggles and lets off a blast from an air horn through a loudhailer. He proceeds to dunk his hungover head in an animal trough of water, before downing a disgusting mixture of milk, vodka and raw egg spiked with speed. All these details are described in Butterworth’s stage directions, though the famous moment when Rylance stands himself up on his hands over the water trough was presumably his inspiration because the text specifies that he more modestly “kneels and sticks his head in the trough.”

The glade in which Rooster’s caravan sits becomes an echo of Shakespeare’s pastoral settings, existing separate from the outside world, where magical things are also possible. The woods are a place of mystery, where mythical pagan figures may dwell, and where untamed nature rules. As the Professor and Rooster so eloquently describe.

There are so many spellbinding theatrical moments in the play and production:

• When Johnny tells Dawn to look deep into his eyes, and she sees something and starts to shake. Against our rational judgement, we believe she has seen some deeper power within him.
• When Rooster weaves the fantastic story of the giant who built Stonehenge and gave him the golden drum that hung from his ear, it builds to a moment of uncanny dramatic suspense, when he challenges the others to bang the drum to summon the giants. Just as they tentatively begin to bang the drum, Rooster’s son Marky appears, bringing the imaginative suspense to a sudden stop.
• One of the most delightful creative touches in the staging of this scene is provided by Rylance stooping down to place his cigarette lighter on the floor to represent himself in scale to the imaginary giant. Theatrical magic.
• Finally when Rooster bangs the drum in earnest at the climax of the play, is it our imagination or do the leaves on the trees surrounding the stage begin to tremble? It’s not explicit in the text, but it may just be a sign of some supernatural force that Rooster is conjuring. Such is the imaginative power of theatre.