Two British ships are about to depart from the same dock for the remote kingdom of Rundoon. The Wasp, led by Captain Scott, will bear Lord Aster, custodian of a mysterious trunk full of precious cargo belonging to the Queen. The Neverland, led by Captain Slank, will bear Lord Aster’s daughter Molly and her nanny Mrs. Bumbrake along a slower and safer route.
While the ships are preparing to leave, Captain Slank sneaks the Queen’s trunk on to The Neverland, swapping it with a decoy trunk to go aboard The Wasp. Captain Slank also secretly buys three orphans - Prentiss, Ted, and Boy - from their savage master Grempkin to sell into slavery on Rundoon and stows them in the bowels of The Neverland.
Before the two ships depart, Lord Aster (still believing the Queen’s trunk to be aboard The Wasp) confides in his daughter Molly that the trunk contains a secret treasure that it is his mission to destroy. Speaking in “Dodo” so that no one (including the audience) but he and Molly can understand, Lord Aster tells Molly what the secret treasure truly is and gives her an amulet identical to his own to keep with her at all times until they reunite in Rundoon.
Aboard The Neverland, Molly and Mrs. Bumbrake quickly learn that Slank is a cruel captain and The Neverland crew is a scary bunch, save for a rough but friendly sailor named Alf who takes a liking to Mrs. Bumbrake. After sneaking out of her cabin to explore the ship, Molly discovers and befriends the three orphans locked up below and ushers them out of their cell to search for food.
Meanwhile, aboard The Wasp, Lord Aster learns that the ship’s crew is actually a group of pirates in disguise led by the legendary Black Stache and his sidekick Smee. They take control of the ship and force Aster to give up his key to the Queen’s trunk. Lord Aster sends Molly a distress signal using his amulet. Moments after receiving the distress signal on The Neverland, Molly sees the ship’s cat floating magically out of the captain’s cabin and realizes that the Queen’s trunk must be in there. She knows this because, as she later confides in Boy, the “precious cargo” in the Queen’s trunk is a magical substance called starstuff, which Lord Aster was commanded by the Queen to destroy lest it fall into the wrong hands.
Back on The Wasp, Black Stache triumphantly opens the trunk only to discover that it’s a decoy trunk full of sand. When Smee figures out that Captain Slank must have stolen the Queen’s trunk, Black Stache orders the pirates to reverse course and chase down The Neverland. Using his amulet again, Lord Aster reports all this to Molly, warning Molly to stay clear of Black Stache and make sure the Queen’s trunk gets back The Wasp.
Mayhem ensues as the two ships approach each other and a hurricane sets in. Soon after Black Stache and his pirates reach and board The Neverland, the ship is hit by lighting and splits in half. Amid the chaos, the Boy meets Black Stache and uses the decoy trunk to distract Black Stache from finding the Queen’s trunk. During their conversation, Black Stache tries to recruit Boy as a pirate, giving him the name “Peter.” Peter keeps the name but refuses the offer, prompting Stache to hurl him into the sea. Still aboard one of the sinking halves of The Neverland, Molly sees Peter in the water, shoves the Queen’s trunk in, and calls out to him to ride it to the island she’s spied in the distance.
And that’s just Act 1! Does Peter make it to the island? What about Molly, Lord Aster, the orphan boys, and all the others? Who inhabits the island and what will become of the trunk of starstuff? How does Peter become Peter Pan? How does Black Stache become Captain Hook? What about Tinkerbell? All will be made known in Act 2!
