Christopher Walken will be Captain Hook in NBC’s live ‘Peter Pan’

[Source: The Hollywood Reporter]

NBC will be following their live presentation of “The Sound of Music” with “Peter Pan” and they already have Oscar winner Christopher Walken lined up for a big role. Christopher Walken will play the notorious Captain Hook in the upcoming production and his portrayal will be interesting to say the least.

NBC still has yet to cast the lead role of Peter Pan. It has been reported that they reached out to Kristen Bell (“Frozen”) to play the part of Peter but she declined due to scheduling conflicts with her Showtime series “House of Lies.” Despite being a male role, it is quite common to have Peter played by a female as seen in the 1960s “Peter Pan” TV movie where the lead was given to Mary Martin.

“We were talking about doing it with a man at one point, but we’ve had several women who wanted to do it and they’re either busy or their schedules don’t work. It’s not like we can film this at any time; I need this person from Aug. 5-Dec. 5, so that knocks out the Kristen Bells of the world, who was somebody I talked to about doing it and she was interested but she’s doing House of Lies,” he said, noting he spoke with the Frozen star before she announced her pregnancy. “It’s tricky finding the right person in the schedule that we need it but we’re actually close. [Peter is] going to be female.”
 

-NBC Entertainment chairman Bob Greenblatt

Although I do enjoy a live production from time to time, I’m not a fan of NBC’s live performance lineups. When seeing a live production, I find it only entertaining to see it performed as a part of the live audience. It’s an experience that you can’t get from television and that is why there is a separation between theater and film. I believe that the majority of viewers watching this may be the same type that go to a hockey game hoping to see a fight or a NASCAR race hoping to see a crash. They’re just wanting to see a prominent actor mess up in some way. Despite my pessimism, I do admit I’m intrigued to see Christopher Walken as Captain Hook and hope we get some “Walkenisms.”