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Preview by Jack Foley
AT A time when pirates appear to be in favour once again, thanks
to the success of Hollywood's Pirates
of the Caribbean, not to mention the forthcoming flicks, Neverland
and Peter Pan, it is little wonder to find the theatre picking
up on current audience trends in time for Christmas.
It has recently been announced that two new productions of Peter
Pan and The Pirates of Penzance are to run at the Savoy
Theatre, in The Strand, for a limited season, from December
15 to March 20, 2004.
Both productions will star Anthony Head, a veteran of the West
End, who has since found fame in cult television programme, Buffy
The Vampire Slayer.
JM Barrie's 1904 children's classic, Peter Pan, tells the timeless
tale of a boy who refuses to mature, preferring instead to remain
in Never Land with his fairy, Tinkerbell, and The Lost Boys, while
trying to avoid the mean-spirited intentions of his longtime nemesis,
Captain Hook.
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While Gilbert and Sullivan's famous 1880 operetta, The Pirates
of Penzance, tells the tale of Frederic, a slave to duty, who
thinks he has completed his apprenticeship to a band of pirates
when he turns 21.
His attempts to follow a more honourable profession are scuppered,
however, when he realises he was born on February 29 of a leap
year - and thus his apprenticeship has many, many more years to
run.
The score includes such classics as Poor Wandering On', I
Am the Very Model of a Modern Major General and Policeman's
Chorus.
Head will plays Captain Hook in Peter Pan and The Pirate King
in The Pirates of Penzance.
Both productions will be directed by Steven Dexter ,and designed
by Francis O'Connor, with lighting by Andrew Bridge.
Peter Pan will be presented by permission of Great Ormond Street
Children's Charity, the London hospital to which Barrie donated
the rights of his play.
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