All I've ever been able to find were a few reviews - here is one from the New York Times - inaccuracy began with the play so it seems:
Copyright 1998 The New York Times Company
The New York Times
March 26, 1998, Thursday, Late Edition - Final
SECTION: Section E; Page 5; Column 1; The Arts/Cultural Desk
LENGTH: 565 words
HEADLINE: THEATER REVIEW;
The Man Who Created 'Peter Pan'
BYLINE: By D. J. R. BRUCKNER
BODY:
In "The Man Who Was Peter Pan" the playwright Allan Knee has performed an
extraordinary act of imagination: he has removed Freud from the world, and
it is an astonishingly different place for that. And the 42d Street Workshop
has found six actors who make that world -- the turn-of-the-century London
that was home to Sir James Barrie, the four Davies boys who inspired his
play "Peter Pan" and their mother -- natural, affecting and distinctly odd.
The toughest roles are the boys, who grow from childhood into teen-agers and
young adults during the play. For the first few minutes one hesitates to
accept these grown-up actors as children, but the reluctance disappears
quickly and entirely. Bruce Barney as George, Jordan Roth as Jack, Tommy
Walsh as Peter and Nicholas Joy as Michael capture the spirit of children so
perfectly that as they grow up during the next two hours, one understands
Barrie's regret that they are changing into young men. Joe Barrett as Barrie
says little enough about that emotion, but he lets the audience feel its
poignancy in a way that endows Barrie's complicated attachment to these boys
with a kind of innocent wisdom. That impression is given depth by Holly
Hawkins as the children's widowed mother, who is at first puzzled by
Barrie's interest in them but never put off by it and whose growing
affection for the playwright becomes almost palpable before she dies,
leaving them to him by making him their ward. Bennett Windheim's direction
is delicate enough to let the force of the affections among these people
build until one is quite surprised at how strong it is.
This is not Mr. Knee's best script. He might have deepened Barrie's
character if he had given Barrie's absent wife more than a few mentions, and
some viewers will find it odd that there is scarcely a word about Barrie's
other plays or novels, though it was his books and one play especially, "The
Admirable Crichton," that allowed him to buy a house for the Davies family
and to send the boys to England's best schools.
The concentration here is solely and intensely on the strange relationship
between the man and the family he carefully contrived to acquire, and it is
a tribute to Mr. Knee, the director and the cast that at the end one is
enfolded in it, understands it and knows it is very strange indeed. Here
Peter Davies, whose name Barrie took for Peter Pan, is the key. As the boy,
Mr. Walsh gets the uncomprehending resentment of youth right: there is
almost a kind of priggishness in his attitude toward Barrie until at last he
is alone with the older man -- George having died in the trenches of World
War I, Jack having gone to America and Michael having drowned as a teen-ager
-- and his loneliness cracks his reserve in a moment that is terrible for
being so quiet.
THE MAN WHO WAS PETER PAN
By Allan Knee; directed by Bennett Windheim; sets by Dennis Eisenberg;
costumes by Agneta Eckemyr; lighting by Izzy Einsidler; original composition
and sound by Scott O'Brien; dialects, K. C. Ligon; associate producer,
Michele Gutman; stage manager, Sandy Moore. Presented by the 42d Street
Workshop, Michelle Bouchard and Jim DeMarse, artistic directors. At 432 West
42d Street, fifth floor, Clinton.
and here is another one:
The Man Who Was Peter Pan. (42nd Street Workshop, New York, New
York)_(theater reviews) Victor Gluck.
Full Text: COPYRIGHT 1998 BPI Communications
Sir James M. Barrie was once among the most well-known play-wrights in the
world, with such hits as "What Every Woman Knows" and "The Admirable
Criebton. "Today his lame rests exclusively on "Peter Pan." In "The Man Who
Was Peter Pan," Allan Knee has attempted to explore the factors that led the
mature author to rite so well about the joys of childhood.
According to the play, at the time that the lonely Barrie's marriage is
breaking up, he meets the Lleweyn Davies brothers, who have just lost their
father. Barrie becomes fast friends with them, sharing in their games.
Eventually he becomes friends with their mother, Sylvia, and becomes part of
the family. In an attempt to impress Peter, who wants to be a writer. Barrie
decides to name Peter Pan after him.
For a modem viewer the play never deals with Barrie's unresolved fascination
with the boys. Was it latent homosexuality, the need for a readymade family,
or his unused paternal instinct? Knee creates all kinds of undereurrents hut
pulls back without making any revelations.
The play is as beautifully written in Edwardian style as it is beautifully
directed by Bennett Windheim. Joe Barrett is magnificent as the conflicted
Scottish author. The actors playing the young men from adolescence to
service in WWI give truly believable performances; Bruce Barney as the
oldest but most loving; Tommy Walsh as the angry, creative Peter; Jordan
Roth as the theatrical, wise Jack; and Nicholas Joy as the spiritual
youngest, Michael.
As the mother Who falls in love with Barrie, Holly Hawkins also gives a
lovely, subtle performance. The unit set by Dennis Eisenberg allows for the
swiftly moving cinematic feel or the play, while Agneta Eckemyr's costumes
allow the actors to age 10 years in the course of the evening.
Presented by and at the 42nd Street Workshop, 432 W. 42nd St., NYC, March
11-28.
Review Grade: A
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