PETER PAN GOES WRONG to Make Bay Area Premiere at San Francisco Playhouse

San Francisco Playhouse will stage the Bay Area Premiere of Peter Pan Goes Wrong. This rollicking comedy comes from the award-winning creatives behind The Play That Goes Wrong, seen at the Playhouse in an uproarious production in 2024.

Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer, and Henry Shields imbue J.M. Barrie's classic story with their trademark madcap mischief. The Cornley Drama Society once again battles backstage blunders and technical mishaps as its members embark on a certain-to-be-ill-fated journey to Neverland. San Francisco Playhouse Producing Director and co-founder Susi Damilano, who has staged sidesplitting spoofs at the Playhouse including Noises Off, Clue, The 39 Steps, and The Play That Goes Wrong, directs.

“Farce has always done more than make us laugh,” said San Francisco Playhouse Artistic Director Bill English. “By pushing human folly to ridiculous extremes, it reveals something painfully true about us. Peter Pan Goes Wrong gleefully skewers one of our most enduring fantasies: the perpetual boy who refuses to grow up and the culture that secretly envies him. But also, beneath the collapsing scenery, bruised egos, and perpetual catastrophe hides a tribute to our astonishing human capacity to keep going. Faced with problems that are completely insurmountable, these hapless players carry on. Perhaps that is farce's greatest gift. It reminds us that blind perseverance is one of the most heroic human traits.”

Director Susi Damilano helms a talented cast to bring the comedic capers to life. Damilano will reunite with several cast members from the Playhouse's The Play That Goes Wrong for this rollicking sequel, with Greg Ayers, Joe Ayers, Renee Rogoff, and Patrick Russell reprising their roles in Peter Pan Goes Wrong.Greg Ayers (he/him) returns t
o the Playhouse as Dennis, a terrified actor. Ayers performed in the Playhouse's The Play That Goes Wrong, The 39 Steps, Clue, Significant Other, Our Town, in a word, and Noises Off. He won the Theatre Bay Area award for Outstanding Performance for Two Mile Hollow at Ferocious Lotus Theatre Company. He has also appeared onstage at New Conservatory Theatre Center and Aurora Theatre Company. As a playwright, his plays have been seen onstage at FringeNYC and Coyote REP.

Peter Pan Goes Wrong features direction by Susi Damilano; scenic design by Cody Tellis Rutledge; lighting design by Christian Mejia; costume design by Kathleen Qiu; sound design by Christopher Ellis (Brooklyn Sound Lab); properties design by Amy Benjamin; intimacy direction by Vicki Hoskins; and fight and stunt direction by Dani O'Dea. Kimberly Mohne Hill is the dialect coach, Bridgette Loriaux is flight consultant, Erin Rose Solorio is choreographer, and Alicia Lerner is the stage manager.