‘Club NVRLND’ is Peter Pan as you’ve never seen him before. He’s absolutely definitely not looking any older, but a little time has passed since he was swooping into the Darling’s nursery and Peter’s now running a nightclub that found its feet in the 2000s and forgot to move forward. Tink’s his right hand woman on the DJ decks. A backflipping Smee (Joel Ekperigin) and wittily-costumed Nana (Becky Bassett) are backing dancers for the glorious compère, Tiger Lily. Hook’s dying to get his hooks into the dilapidated building to give it a twenty-first century makeover. And Wendy’s about to get wed.

This is a brand new immersive show, set in the marvellously atmospheric Assembly Checkpoint, a one-time church, now a raucous, rowdy cabaret bar. It’s Peter’s 30th birthday and we’ve been asked along to celebrate with him. J-Lo’s ‘Let’s Get Loud’ hollers out of the impressive speakers, Tiger Lily wriggles into action and the party kicks off. This is theatre as there’s a story, and it’s emphatically a jukebox musical as it’s full to the brim with pop party classics, but first and foremost, this is a high-energy club classic party. And this Friday night crowd loved it.

Writer Jack Holden has fun fast-forwarding JM Barrie‘s story for an audience starting to miss their youth. While the script lacks edge, there are flashes of wit and any vacuum is filled to the brim with the boundless enthusiasm of this cast. Taut choreography (Ashley Nottingham) makes great use of the space. Steven Kunis, director and mastermind of the whole venture may just have created a new Fringe institution.

All of that said, the cast and the soundtrack (Beyoncé, Britney, Justin T, Christina Aguilera, Katy Perry, Coldplay) are the heros here. Tiger Lily (Le Fil, known to many from RuPaul’s UK Drag Race 2024) is a brash but sweet compere who copes admirably with a zillion spangly costume changes. Lizzie Woford is a perfectly practical but nicely wistful Tink. Martha Kirby makes easy work of the soaring pop ballads and gives Wendy plenty of much-needed backbone. And Thomas Grant pulls off just the right mix of narcissistic brat and charismatic rockstar to have this audience whooping for more.

This was the show’s opening night so the sound problems, borne with forbearance by poor Wendy, are likely to be ironed out by now. For anyone with mobility issues or prone to fatigue, this is a standing show that ran longer (this time) than the billed one hour and fifteen minutes. Inevitably in a converted church, the sight lines aren’t great everywhere so take the cast at their word when they tell you to follow the action. But immersive theatre is a rare commodity in the Fringe so if you’re up for it, embrace it. This Friday night crowd were brimming with energy, bursting to dance and sing along and they had a ball.

‘Club NVRLND’ is at Assembly Checkpoint – Checkpoint until Sun 24 Aug 2025 at 21:15