Another "New" Pic!

Okay so I saw this one last night on the Disney Archives Facebook page, because guess what?  Peter Pan was released 65 years ago yesterday!

I had completely forgotten, but am glad they didn't.  And this variation of the window scene tells us that Disney Archive probably has far more pictures of Bobby than we'll ever know about.  I can only hope that over time, they will leak more.

It always makes me happy to see Bobby as Peter Pan.  I do realize that that particular role for him has been over-emphasized because of the metaphors of "lost boy" and Neverland's parallels to paradise or heaven.  I myself grew my Bobby affection from having first seen him in a Peter Pan costume.  But it's kind of a funny thing, because I don't really know how much he actually identified with the role, or would have wanted to have been considered so synonymous with the character himself for the next sixty-five years.  We know from later interviews and statements that Bobby seemed to want to be a serious professional not associated as much with his childhood work. 

So how would he really have felt about being immortalized as Peter Pan? 

Another way to look at this is to regard the statement made by one of his girls telling that he was known to have loved children.  This definitely seems to have been true by other accounts.  Maybe, now, he would see how much joy this role has brought to kids from all over the world, and would relish that. 

In all likelihood, the answer is probably something in between.  We all go through different phases of our lives when we see various experiences we've had through different lenses, disdaining some things when we look back on them during certain periods, and embracing them during others.  The thing is, Bobby didn't live long enough to get the chance to appreciate his childhood work again.  We see his life from a totally different vantage point now than he probably saw it back then.  For him, his childhood adulation did him no favors as an adult, trying to find purpose and make his own way in the world.

But all that said, I still think that if he had lived to see this day -- the day after the 65th anniversary of his most famous work -- he would have been proud.