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Maude Adams and the LGBTQ History of Peter Pan

Kaz Rowe

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In 1905, Maude Adams took the stage as Peter Pan. She would go on to define the role for generations, making Peter the icon he is today. But the secret behind her allure was the hidden fact that Maude Adams was a lesbian, the first in a long line of sapphic actresses playing Peter Pan. Come learn with me about Peter’s LGBTQ history, and the life of Maude Adams: actress, lesbian, philanthropist, and inventor.

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Sources:

Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie

The Longest Street by Louis Sobol

Maude Adams by Acton Davies

Maude Adams: An Intimate Portrait by Phyllis Robbins

Maude Adams: Idol of the American Theater, 1872-1953 by Armond Fields

The Peter Pan Chronicles by Bruce K. Hanson

The One I Knew Least of All by Maude Adams

The gay & lesbian theatrical legacy : a biographical dictionary of major figures in American stage history in the pre-Stonewall Era by Billy J. Harbin, Kim Marra, and Robert A. Schanke

Maude Adams by Frederic Dean for Good Housekeeping Magazine, May 1913

Heroines of the Modern Stage By Forrest Izard

Maude Adams as L'Aiglon: A Pictorial Souvenir

Maude Adams: a biography by Ada Patterson

Barrie, the story of J. M. B. by Denis Mackail

Daniel Frohman presents; an autobiography by Daniel Frohman

The Great White Way; a re-creation of Broadway's golden era of theatrical entertainment by Allen Churchill

Peter Pan or The Boy Who Would Not Grow Up (The Play) By J.M. Barrie

Charles Frohman: manager and man, by Isaac F. Marcosson and Daniel Frohman, with an appreciation by James M. Barrie

Child Labor on the Stage -- A Symposium by Jane Addams, Henry Baird Favill and Jean M. Gordon

The Maude Adams book by Charles Frohman

My years on the stage by John Drew

Maude Adams and the Mormons by J. Michael Hunter

Maude Adams and her Long Island Farm by Gustav Kobbé for Ladies Home Journal

The Legend of Maude Adams, New York Times, March 1, 1914

Peter Pan in Science by Herbert W. Forster, New York Times, Oct 2, 1921

Maude Adams: Her Life and Career by Sara Ellen Wheatley Roderer

Maude Adams to Renounce Solitude by Polly Ferguson, Lima News, April 11, 1926

For Believers in Fairies, New York Times, October 18, 1905

The Silent Movie Peter Pan (1924) by Jim Korkis for Mouse Planet https://www.mouseplanet.com/13114/The...

MASCULINE UNCERTAINTY AND MALE HOMOSOCIALITY IN J.M. BARRIE'S PETER PAN STORIES by Krystal Lynn Hawkins

A Friendship in Letters: Robert Louis Stevenson & J. M. Barrie by Michael Shaw

Playing Peter Pan: Conceptualizing "Bois" in Contemporary Queer Theory by Sarah Trimble

Childhood and Greek Love: Dorian Gray and Peter Pan by Holly Blackford

J.M. Barrie's Peter Pan in and Out of Time: A Children's Classic at 100 by Donna R. White, C. Anita Tarr

20 Comments

@KazRowe Creator 3 years ago Pinned

Go to https://www.piavpn.com/KazRowe to grab an 82% discount on Private Internet Access! That's just $2.03 a month, with 4 extra months completely for free! :]

@hannahbrown2728 3 years ago

Getting a friend to trawl around the rocks in a floofy dress just for the gag of her saying "Yeah" is peak

@kindofcl 3 years ago

I really relate to that queer/neurodivergent/mentally ill feeling of feeling more like an adult when you're a kid and more like a kid when you're an adult

@oomflem 3 years ago

As a five year old, I fiercely insisted on having "peter pan hair", aka a pixie cut, despite obviously having no concept of the genderbending and LGBTQ history of the character. I guess you can say it was a foreshadowing of things to come.

@juliajensen6612 3 years ago

I studied Peter Pan in college, and this quote about Hook has stuck with me for more than 25 years:
“In the dark nature there was a touch of the feminine, as in all the great pirates, and it sometimes gave him intuitions.”
– Peter Pan, Chapter 8: “The Mermaid’s Lagoon”

@nekkidnora 3 years ago

Thank you SO much for addressing the rumours of pedophilia- as an asexual who adored Peter Pan as a kid, I cling to him perhaps a bit more than I should, and I've always taken those with a grain of salt, because it seems to boil down to "well he didn't have lovers" and "well he liked being around kids", both of which apply to myself as well, and it's just- it's so dehumanizing to me, to see people who literally can't imagine that there wasn't some sex scandal. They'd rather imagine him as some monster than try to imagine a life of asexuality, too. (obviously it's problematic to apply labels to historical figures, but I'm using it to illustrate how I see him, and how I identify with him).

@eireduchess 3 years ago (edited)

For me the “secret sinister darkness” in Peter Pan is what happened to poor Bobbie Driscoll and how Disney was more or less responsible for ruining his life. It’s so interesting to hear about the original stage play and Barrie’s original vision for the work itself and the history of the play since it’s inception

@iggysmice3087 3 years ago (edited)

It's very unfortunate that men who just genuinely like to hang out with kids are viewed as so suspect. My dad is one such man, and he's honestly one of the nicest people I've ever met and would never hurt a kid. My mom also loves children, of course she'd marry a guy who felt the same way!
Edit to add another funfact: My mom is a black woman, and grew up in rural Oregon, so she was very keenly aware of what racism is and how harmful it can be. Therefore, whenever my brother and I would watch Disney's Peter Pan, my mom would jump up and fast-forward through the parts with the racist caricatures. As a result, I didn't see any of those parts until I was a teenager watching the movie at my friend's house at a sleepover, and I was shocked. A few years later my brother had the same experience but as a 20 year old adult. When you're older and know what racism is, old cartoons like that are just... something else.

@sundownsahara 3 years ago

Interesting take on Peter Pan, a story I love very much. You did forget that J.M. Barrie's brother, who was his mother's favorite, died in childhood. His mother sank into depression and basically ignored Barrie, telling him "you will grow up and become a man, but your brother will always be a little boy". I always thought the story of Peter and everyone idolizing him/ his love and fear of motherly love was based on this time in Barrie's life. I'm sure his sexuality played some role, but there's never just one influence in the creation of a classic.

@ysodora8030 3 years ago

I totally relate to your experience of watching Peter Pan 2003 as a child. However the feelings of wanting to be like Peter and loving Wendy were also contrasted with the conflicting feelings of wanting to be Wendy and loving Peter. It seems I had a very bisexual experience. Figures.

@birdboi-nd3so 2 years ago

“[When] a new baby laughs for the first time a new fairy is born, and as there are always new babies there are always new fairies. They live in nests on the tops of trees; and the mauve ones are boys and the white ones are girls, and the blue ones are just little sillies who are not sure what they are.”
that is my favorite quote from the book

@dylanthehopelessrema 3 years ago (edited)

Wow, I didn’t know about any of this before your video! Queer history really does seem to go totally unnoticed by the general public, or at least it feels that way to me.

@l33machine 3 years ago

I really really really appreciate you discussing queer history like this. It's often framed with queer discourse nowadays that younger folks are just queer for fun and for a fad. Your channel really highlights how queer people have ALWAYS been around, it's just now that we're able to explore and be ourselves instead of hiding in the shadows.

@teapotsoup2851 3 years ago

Am trans guy, definitely relate to the 'never growing up' aspect of Peter pan. I remember being 8 and realising that my options for growing up were 'lady' or 'woman' and was horrified by my choices.

@RariettyC 3 years ago (edited)

This has made me desperately want a movie about J.M. Barrie and Robert Louis Stevenson writing letters to each other (+how that all could relate to their mutual affinity for stories about pirates, to the point of them now sharing a legacy as probably the two most impactful authors when it comes to depictions of piracy in pop culture)

@sophiabreidfischer6242 3 years ago

Not exactly the main point but after hearing about Frohmans death I was moved I had to look into it more. He had a cane and pain in 1 knee so jumping into the lifeboats wouldve been hard. He tied lifejackets to babys cradles before his own death. A very kind man!

@joseybryant7577 3 years ago (edited)

Went down a Barrymore family Wikipedia rabbit hole a few weeks ago. Somehow missed the connection to Maude, but ended up at Clement Scott. A critic that said theatre is a gateway to Hell basically.

@powmushu 3 years ago

The boy who played Peter in 2003 was part of why I figured out I was gay so early. He was probably one of my first childhood crushes. Him or the guy from the little vampire. Cool to know I wasn't the only one that movie effected

@megadams9665 3 years ago

as a child, i was always obsessed with stories like peter pan, alice in wonderland, and the wizard of oz because of the promise that any ordinary child could be whisked away and have an adventure of a lifetime. they all still mean so much to me even as an adult.

i was also obsessed with the 2003 adaptation when it came out and became re-obsessed with it in middle school, half because i went through a tomboy phase and wanted to be peter, and the other half because i realized my best friend looked like wendy and i didn't realize i was in love with her. so a world where i could be peter and my best friend could be wendy was so ideal for me.