THUNDER BAY – The Confederation College Performing Arts Club will perform a rendition of the Peter Pan story, "Never, Neverland – The Chronicles of Peter Pan," on Friday and Saturday.
Jarin Brown is the current student president of the Confederation College Performing Arts Club and is playing Nibs, a lost boy.
“The Confederation College Performing Arts Club is the longest running club at Confederation College. This is our 25th year in operation. It's made up of current students, past students, staff, faculty and friends from the community.
“We typically put on three or four shows a year. Our summer show for the last few years has always been an outdoor show on times when it's been nice enough to perform outside and has also usually been based on classics. That's why we're doing Peter Pan as this year's sort of classic story adapted in a new way,” he said.
Brown has been involved with the club going on two years, he said, adding that this show is an adaptation of the classic Peter Pan story that he rewrote himself.
“I was given a public domain version of the story to work off of and then just added my own spin to things. The story of Peter Pan is typically about not wanting to grow up.
“We really looked at the opposite of that, which is wanting to grow up too fast. A lot of the conflict in the story comes from Wendy never wanting to grow up and her younger brother Michael, who thinks that he needs to grow up as quickly as possible.”
This story is something that a lot of people have seen and many have done their own versions of, Brown said.
“Because it has that framework that everybody knows, it was really easy to come up with new things that maybe people haven't seen without having to worry too much about the audience not understanding, because they know the story of Peter Pan.
“They just don't know this version of Peter Pan,” he said.
Brown started by reading through the original play and finding the story beats that he liked as well as the lines that he liked, going through that and thinking of what he should change and what should stay the same.
“The actual figuring out of the story took maybe a week or so, and then maybe about a week and a bit to fully write out the script. We've been making small changes throughout just depending on what was working.
“We've had the script for the whole time, but we've made sure that it's a work in progress and we allow other club members to contribute their own ideas of what they think,” he said.
Ethan Mofford plays Peter in "Never Neverland."
Mofford said this version brings a lot more modern sensibilities and a lot of fun jokes to the production.
“We've spent the last two or so months now working on this. The whole cast is really excited to show this off to everybody.”
There are approximately 20 people involved in the play, he said.
“Wendy Darling, a small 12-year-old child, is feeling daunted by the fear of adulthood about to enter her life. She wants to escape all of it and what a better way than to follow a small other 12-year-old boy, Peter Pan, to Neverland and try to escape everything.
“As we go through the story, we start seeing her and her brothers experience the fun of being a youth and the dangers of trying to avoid a future coming and what it means to grow up as a whole.”
This is Mofford’s first time doing a play with the Confederation College Performing Arts Club.
“After the first read through, I fell in love almost immediately with this group. They're such a wonderful and collaborative group to work with.
“You can see the skill and properness of everybody the second they enter the stage,” he said.
The box office will open at 7:00 p.m. on both days, a half an hour prior to the show.
Tickets are $20 for general admission and $10 college students.
“All of our proceeds are going to charity. Last year we donated to the Northern Cancer Fund and this year is still yet to be decided,” he said.
Mofford said the number one goal is to bring adults, and people of all ages, a quick reminder of how fun it was when they were a kid.
“We hope to inspire that in everybody that comes to see the show.”
The performance will occur on July 26 and 27 at 7:30 p.m. outside of Confederation College's SUCCI Wellness Centre.
