Peter and the Starcatcher - Characters

The Orphans

Boy: A boy who doesn’t miss much. Nameless, homeless, and friendless at the beginning of the play and a hero by the end. A survivor. More than anything in the world, he wants a home and a family. If he could grow up, he’d fall for Molly in a big way. But it’ll never happen.

Prentiss: Ambitious, hyper-articulate, logical; yearns to be a leader, even as he knows in his heart that he shall never be one. A bit of a blowhard with just the teeny-tiniest touch of cowardice.

Ted: Obsessed with food: the eating of, the fighting over, the dreaming about. A natural actor, an easy wit, perhaps a future poet. Called “Tubby” by Prentiss, though not due to girth, of which orphans, given their meager diets, have very little indeed.

The British Subjects

Lord Leonard Aster: The very model of a Victorian English gentleman, loyal subject to the Queen, devoted father, faithful friend. Also, and not irrelevant to our story, Lord Astor is a Starcatcher—dedicated to protecting the Earth and all who dwell thereon from the awesome power of starstuff.

Molly Aster: A true leader at a time when girls are mostly followers. Will risk everything for the sake of Doing Right. Curious, intelligent, beginning to feel thing she doesn’t yet understand—romantic longings that revert to childish tantrums under pressure—because, after all, she’s a thirteen-year-old kid. She’ll be a great woman one day.

Mrs. Bumbrake: Molly’s nanny. British to the bone. Still has enough of her girlish charm to turn a sailor’s head and leaven his dreams. Stiff in the lip, loose in the hip, fun on the ship.

Captain Robert Falcon Scott: Captain of Britain’s fastest ship, the Wasp. Years later, he will lead an expeditionary team to the South Pole, freeze to death, and become the iconic British hero, Scott if the Antarctic.

Grempkin: The mean and malodorous schoolmaster of St. Norbert’s Orphanage for Lost Boys. Likes to keep his boys in the dark, as sunlight is known to feed rebellious notions, and on account of the preference in certain quarters for lads that are white and pasty.

The Seafarers

Aboard The Wasp

Black Stache: Long after everyone else got out of the pirate business, Black Stache continues to terrorize the seven seas in search of a hero worthy of his villainy. Famous for his face foliage, he started shaving at age ten, had a bushy handlebar by eleven, and the blood of twenty crews on his hands by twelve. Heartless and hirsute, suspiciously well read, partial to the poetical and theatrical, and given to a ferocity from which no good will ever come.

Smee: First mate to Black Stache. Single-mindedly dedicated to his captain’s every whim. His motto: “’Tis good to be busy.”

Sánchez: A hard-working Spanish pirate with an identity crisis.

Aboard The Neverland

Bill Slank: The Neverland’s vicious captain, without the skill or quality to lead anyone but himself, and always into disaster. A greedy bastard who’d sell his own mother for a ship to command and send boys to their doom for the favor of those who would use starstuff for personal gain, global domination, or worse. And orphan, too.

Alf: An old seadog. Something about him appeals to the feminine sensibility—might be his bowlegs, his saucy gait, or his kind heart.

Mack: A very bad sailor who wants to be anywhere but under the thumb of Bill Slank.

The Mollusks

Fighting Prawn: King of the Mollusks, son of Jumbo Prawn and Littleneck Clam. Kidnapped by British sailors and brought in chains to England, he served as a sous-chef in a country estate in Derbyshire, where, for no good reason, he learned Italian wines and mastered Italian cuisine. Since returning to his island kingdom, he vengefully murders any English person with the temerity to land on his Mollusk Isle domain.

Hawking Clam: Son of Fighting Prawn and Sweet’n’Sour Shrimp. One day, he will ascend the throne as head of the Royal Clam Clan.

Teacher: Formerly a salmon, now an ancient, knowledgeable mermaid.