Updated 05-Oct-2026
I have a history with Peter Pan, since a young age. Even though Wendy is an invented (as a female given name, though it was used as a surname previously) which first appeared in Peter Pan (a musical theatre production) in 1904. In the summer of 1977 I was cast as Michael, the smallest of the three Darling children, in the Forest Roberts Theatre, Northern Michigan University production. My sister was also cast as one of the indians in the production.
It was a glorious time. I found myself on stage with adults (all other of the Darling children were adult actors) as well as Peter Pan and Tinker Bell. Even more enthralling was the fact that they had a flying setup using harnesses and wires. Only the five of us used it, and I was the only child actor who got to use it. It was my first brush with fame among my peers, which I didn't understand at the time. Even though Linda, someone whom I thought only held disdain for me, confessed her like, I soon, once again, disappeared into obscurity.
I do recall that one time during rehearsal, the wires got stuck and I was high up in the air for about 2 hours, waiting while the found the tallest ladder on campus, which only barely reached up to me, and one of the stage hands was able to unhook me. I also remember vividly how annoyed mother was with having to give us endless rides to the rehearsal and production shows.
My voice cracked a few times during that production. Also, I learned the value of hamming things up, as I once ad-libbed cartwheeling my legs around in the air while in a flying sequence, during an early (live) production, and heard the audiance laugh out loud. The director told me to do that again from then on. And a final memory was of how it was surprising that Peter Pan was played by a woman actor, and how nevertheless brutish the actor was. I'm pretty sure she didn't like children in the least, much less boys.
It was only later I realized that in the past, children were not allowed to act on stage, and that women were given the child parts to play. A series of theatrical productions in the UK and US were mounted and the first one where actors flew over the heads of the audience was in 1928 starring Eva Le Galliene.