Christopher Walken, best known for his dramatic bad guy roles, will play Captain Hook in NBC's live musical version of "Peter Pan," the network's follow-up to last year's "Sound of Music" holiday special.
Walken will reunite with producers Craig Zadan and Neil Meron, who worked together on the motion picture version of the hit play "Hairspray," on the project, slated to premiere in December. NBC Entertainment chairman Bob Greenblatt said over the weekend that the network had hoped to cast Kristen Bell as well, but could
not work it out schedule-wise, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
"[Walken is] one of the most unique actors in our business," Greenblatt said at the Television Critics Association summer tour Sunday. "He might really just be a song and dance man at heart . . . I can guarantee he's going to bring his own spin to Captain Hook. This might be the first tap-dancing Captain Hook you've ever seen."
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Indeed, Walken does have some moves as seen in a
viral YouTube video that hit the Internet in March. Set to "Everybody Dance Now," the video included clips of Walken dancing from 57 different films, including his Oscar-winning performance in "The Deer Hunter," "Batman Returns," "Pulp Fiction," "Catch Me If You Can," "Wedding Crashers," and "Hairspray."
Greenblatt told the tour that he is still looking for someone to play the lead role of Peter Pan, but confirmed that it will be a female actress, according to The Reporter.
"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," Greenblatt said Sunday. "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.' 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."
"Peter Pan" is NBC's follow-up to last year's "Sound of Music Live" event, starring Carrie Underwood. Though the production didn't find critical success, it was still a ratings winner,
pulling in 18.6 million viewers, according to USA Today.
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