CHARACTER BREAKDOWN
Casting Note: highly likely some roles will be doubled.

THE ORPHANS

Boy (Peter): Male age 16 to 40. A 13-year-old 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: Male age 16 to 40. Also 13 years old. Ambitious, hyper-articulate, logical;
yearns to be leader, even as he knows in his heart that he never shall be one. A bit of a
blowhard with just the teeny-tiniest touch of cowardice.

Ted: Male age 16 to 40. Also 13 years old. 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

Captain Robert Falcon Scott: Male age mid-20s to 60. Captain of the Britain’s fastest
frigate, the Wasp. Years later, he would lead an expeditionary team to the South Pole,
freeze to death, and become the iconic British hero, Scott of the Antarctic.

Grempkin: Male age 30+. 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.

Lord Leonard Aster: Male age 30 to 60. Old enough to have a 13-year-old daughter.
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 Aster is a
Starcatcher—dedicated to protecting the Earth and all who dwell thereon from the
awesome power of starstuff.

Molly Aster: Female age 16 to 40. Also 13 years old. 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 things 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: Male age mid-20s to 50. Molly’s nanny. Over 40. 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 a ship. Will cast a male actor to play
this female character but not interested in a drag-like performance.

THE SEAFARERS

Alf: Male age mid-30’s+. An old sea dog. Something about him appeals to the
feminine sensibility—might be his bowlegs, his saucy gait, or his kind heart. Not a
thin man.

Bill Slank: Male age mid-20’s+. The Neverland’s vicious captain, without the skill or
quality to lead anyone but himself—and always into disaster. A greedy louse 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 startsuff for personal gain, global domination, or worse. An
orphan, too.

Black Stache: Male age mid-20’s+. 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 hairy, suspiciously well read, partial to the poetical and theatrical, and given to a
ferocity from which no good shall ever spring.

Mack: Female age 18+. A very bad sailor who wants to be anywhere but under the
thumb of Bill Slank.

Smee: Male age 18+. First mate to Black Stache. Single-mindedly dedicated to his
captain’s every whim. His motto: “’Tis good to be busy.” Plays the ukulele.

Sanchez: Male age 18+. A hard-working Spanish pirate with an identity crisis.

THE NATIVES

Fighting Prawn: Male age 30+. King of the mollusks, son of Jumbo Prawn and
Littleneck Clam. Kidnapped by British sailors and brought in chains to England, he
served as 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 with the temerity to land on his Mollusk
Isle domain.

Hawking Clam: Male age 18+ Son of Fighting Prawn and Swee’n’sour Shrimp. One
day, he will ascend the Clam throne as head of the Royal Clam Clan.
Teacher: Female age 18+. Formerly a salmon; now an ancient, knowledgeable
mermaid.