10 fun facts you might not know about Peter Pan — Ballet Edition

1. Peter Pan was written for the stage. J.M. Barrie first created the character Peter Pan for his 1902 novel The Little White Bird. After befriending Arthur and Sylvia Llewelyn-Davies and their five sons, he wrote the play Peter Pan or The Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up in 1904.
   
2. This year marks the 100th anniversary of the 1924 American silent adventure film Peter Pan released by Paramount Pictures. It was the first film adaptation of the 1904 play by J. M. Barrie.
   
3. Foy Inventerprises (also known as Flying by Foy), the company that creates the flying sequences in this ballet, owes its existence to Peter Pan. Peter Foy acted in the 1941 Where the Rainbow Ends and when the stage manager became ill, he took over the flying sequences. By 1950, as an employee of Kirby’s Flying Ballets, he supervised the flying in the Broadway production of Peter Pan with Jean Arthur and Boris Karloff; and in 1954 Jerome Robbins selected him to create the magic of flight for his Broadway musical with Mary Martin. 
4. The success of the flying in Peter Pan helped pave the way for many future Broadway and other stage productions to implement advanced technologies in their performances. 
5. Green became an iconic color for Peter from Disney’s 1953 movie. The role was historically played in auburns, tans, and browns. 
6. Peter Pan took the U.S. and England by storm on stage as a play, but it wasn’t until the late 20th Century that the childhood tale was transformed into a ballet production. Edward McGuire’s Peter Pan: a Ballet in 3 Acts was performed 120+ times by Scottish Ballet between 1989 and 1995. 
7. Summer of 1994, Carmon DeLeone composed the score for Atlanta Ballet Artistic Director John McFall’s Peter Pan ballet. In 1999, DeLeone conducted its debut in the 28-performance run with Atlanta Ballet at London’s Royal Festival Hall during its Millennium celebration. 
   1. BONUS FACT: John grew up in Kansas City and studied under KCB founder Tatiana Dokoudovska! 
8. In 2006, Jorden Morris’ Peter Pan broke records in the Royal Winnipeg Ballet’s box office.
9. Michael Pink’s Peter Pan debuted in 2010 with Milwaukee Ballet.
10. Kansas City Ballet’s Devon Carney debuted his Peter Pan in 2018 and was heavily inspired by Carmon DeLeone’s score. At the time, Devon Carney’s Peter Pan was the third or fourth ballet production to use DeLeone’s music. 

Photography Credit: KCB Dancers including Michael Davis and Dillon Malinski in Devon Carney’s 2018 production of Peter Pan. Photographed by Brett Pruitt & East Market Studios.