What’s a Peter Pan story without a few pirates? When you journey to Neverland with the sweetly innocent Peter in tow, though, you mainly expect to see Captain Hook. And you will. But first, as Joe Wright prepares to pull back the curtain on next summer’s Pan, we meet Blackbeard, the true villain of the piece as played by Hugh Jackman.
Entertainment Weekly gets the exclusive images of Jackman in character as Blackbeard, the ruthless pirate legend who’ll be the foil to young Peter Pan (newcomer Levi Miller). That doesn’t mean that Joe Wright’s spin on the J.M. Barrie classic will lack for tradition, even as the director tells the magazine, "This isn’t exactly the Neverland story you know." Garrett Hedlund will play Hook, though he still has both hands and is painted more as a rugged explorer trapped in Neverland and willing to help young Peter. Rooney Mara plays Tiger Lily, an action heroine who might be the focus of the movie. And the majority of the scenery will be devoured by Hugh Jackman, playing the orphan-stealing Blackbeard.
Joe Wright has been dabbling in period epics for some time now, having helmed such masterpieces as Atonement, Pride & Prejudice and Anna Karenina with Keira Knightley. On a recent set visit to the London shoot of Pan, he told us at length all the different ways that he wanted to reinterpret the fairy tale story of J.M. Barrie, and we get a hint of these changes in his approach to pirates and Peter.
But this is only the first shot fired in what’s sure to be a lengthy marketing campaign. I’m hoping this means a trailer will drop soon, because what we were able to see of Joe Wright’s Neverland will take your breath away. If you want to see more of Peter Pan, and the ship he takes from London to Neverland, click the following link. Pan opens in theaters on July 17, 2015. Here’s an up-close shot of Levi Miller, the young boy cast as Peter Pan with the intention of possibly launching a franchise.
And when Peter is snatched out of his orphanage by Blackbeard’s crew, here’s the boat that takes him on his amazing journey:
