To be entirely honest, I don't really know how or why I first came to be invited to work on Peter Pan - A Musical Adventure although I do have a theory which is all my own.

Prior to this present collaboration, I had not met George Stiles. However, I had worked previously with Anthony Drewe on another show - except, on that occasion, having suddenly been taken ill, I had been carted off to the Intensive Care Unit of my local hospital on the day after the first read-through.

There I had remained, incarcerated in hospital right through rehearsals, not to emerge until after the show had opened in Regent's Park.

It has always been my unspoken belief that Mr Drewe (or 'Ants' as I have come to know him) had not noticed my absence during that entire rehearsal period. Thus, in the belief that his book writer was ever-present but tucked away somewhere at the back of the rehearsal room, he had imagined that the silence signified I was an easy-going sort of chap to work with (which indeed is how I see myself).

On which basis, way back in the mid 1990s, he had recommended me to George (for I am on first-name terms now with that gentleman too) as an ideal collaborative partner for their proposed Peter Pan project which had been commissioned by Imagination Entertainments.

Trusting Ants' judgment, George sent me a CD of the several songs which they had already written for the musical - I have been whistling them non-stop ever since, as my wife will ruefully testify. These were the same songs that picked up a couple of prestigious awards when a mini-version of our show was entered in an International Musical Contest, in Aarhus, Denmark, in 1996 - and the point In time when Julia (McKenzie) Joined our team as Director. The Aarhus achievements led to the first full scale stage production, which opened in December 2000, at the New Theatre in Copenhagen.

And here we are, some six years after we started out on this Musical Adventure, presenting the World Premiere of the concert version, still happily on first name terms, and with all kinds of plans for the stage show in the pipeline, for 2002 - but those ambitions are strictly under wraps and still to be announced . . .

Willis Hall
Book

I was eight years old when I first met Peter Pan. It was January 1969 and he flew in through the windows of a set at the Scala Theatre in Gower Street, which has long since been pulled down. Peter was played by a very pretty lady (Wendy Craig), a fact which didn't seem to bother me at all; Captain James Hook, on the other hand, as portrayed by Alastair Sim, troubled me deeply. I can still see the dark rings beneath his eyes in the ghoulish green lighting as he descended into the Home Under The Ground intent on poisoning Peter.

Having just turned forty I am sure that, like everyone else, there is something of Peter Pan that lives on inside me - never wanting to grow up and imagining that I'm still younger than my birth certificate betrays. The idea of writing a new musical version of Peter Pan arose in 1991 when George and I were working with Steven Spielberg and Cameron Mackintosh on the development of another of our shows, Just So, for an animated movie. Spielberg had just released the film Hook, and he felt that there may be another movie version of the timeless story still waiting to be made.

Cameron turned to us and said 'Well, why don't you think about writing a new musical version?' It was four years later, and with our friend and collaborator Willis Hall on board to adapt J M Barrie's play, that we felt the time was right to throw open the nursery windows and start on this flight of fancy.

Although I know that there have been other musical adaptations of the story, I have never actually seen any of them - I have only ever seen the play and the Disney cartoon.

Having said that, when you read the play it 'sings' to you and tells you where the songs need to be placed - so I'm sure, in that regard, similarities will exist with other versions.

George and I have tried to write an eclectic score that mirrors the fantasy and imagination of the play, with a reverence for Barrie's work, and which we hope appeals to the child in all of us.

Anthony Drewe
Lyricist

It says 'composer' on my passport. Not that a passport would be much use when trying to get through customs in Never Land: a case of smuggled pirate rum would be nearer the mark. But it does say 'composer' and I suppose it must be right, since the dictionary says that 'to compose' means 'to form by putting together'. That is the great joy of composing for the theatre - the chance to be inspired by a story, a character, a situation and then put that together with the book and the lyrics and be inspired even more.

Willis Hall's version of Barrie's play is quite extraordinary: it manages to distil three hours of the original into a 'book' that still allows Ants and me room for about eighteen songs. It is the 'tardis' of adaptations, since once you are inside, it seems just as packed with character, atmosphere and incident as the original.

Anthony Drewe and I have been writing songs and scores together for long enough to identify quite strongly with Peter's wish to 'be a boy for ever, and have fun'. It is such a wonderful story to set to music - for me the problem was what to leave out, not what to put in. We wanted to write a contemporary sounding score, without anchoring the musical language in any one period; after all, the story Is so timeless. It is scary to tackle something that is so deep in our collective consciousness, but at the same time It is irresistible.

Gary Withers (from Imagination) has shown great faith throughout the development of this piece, and without him I very much doubt whether Ants and I would still be writing.

We owe him a huge debt of thanks. Lastly, I want to say thank you to Julia McKenzie and Jonathan Butterell for their belief and excitement and to John Cameron for dressing my music in such colourful and beautifully tailored clothes.

It has been a joyful experience making Peter, Wendy, Hook and the Lost Boys sing, and we hope a little of that joy is communicated when you watch and listen to Peter Pan..

George Stiles
Composer