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"Peter Pan" Film (Cancelled Project)

Date range assessed by the fact that “Associated Press” covered Michael’s inclusion of the “Peter Pan” film in April 1983.

“Associated Press” (April 13, 1983) (archived)

"E.T.” creator Steven Spielberg is planning to turn his talents to whimsy again with a big-screen production of the enduring "Peter Pan" — in which singer Michael Jackson will star.

Michael Jackson, "Life" magazine (December 1997)

[Michael Jackson’s] planning a film version of J.M. Barrie's Peter Pan fable, having been misled, he says, by Steven Spielberg, who he believes reneged on an offer to cast Michael in Hook six years ago. "I worked on the script, writing songs, for six months," says Michael. "And they let me down. I was so heartbroken. Steven Spielberg admitted later it was a mistake. I was torn. He put me through a lot. We're friends now, though."

Steven Spielberg, director, “Entertainment Weekly” (December 8, 2011) (archived)

In the late ’80s, Michael Jackson lobbied for the lead role in Hook, though Spielberg got him to back off. “Michael had always wanted to play Peter Pan, and we were very close friends in those days,” Spielberg says. “But I called Michael and said, ‘This is about a lawyer that is brought back to save his kids and discovers that he was once, when he was younger, Peter Pan.’ So Michael understood at that point it wasn’t the same Peter Pan he wanted to make.” The role, of course, went to Robin Williams.