Disney scuppers Peter Pan movie over legal row

Plans of a film adaptation of Peter Pan that had been set to cast Audrey Hepburn in its lead role were axed following a legal row between Walt Disney and Great Ormond Street Hospital.

The London hospital, which had aspired to raise tens of thousands of pounds for patient care, had been gifted the rights to the play by JM Barrie in 1929.

However, the 10 million-pound version, proposed in 1964, had never taken off after the Hollywood studio threatened to turn to court, claiming it owned all the cinematic rights to the drama, reports the Telegraph.

According to sources in the confidential documents in the hospital’s private archive, Disney, which had animated Peter Pan in 1953, “was putting its own commercial needs before the needs of sick children.”

However, a Walt Disney Company spokesman said: “Disney has supported Great Ormond Street Hospital over many years and in January 2008 the Company announced that it would join forces with Great Ormond Street Hospital Children’s Charity to raise 10 million pounds towards the Hospital’s capital appeal.”

The two sides have had a clashing history in the past.

In 2003, Walt Disney had aborted a live action film version of Peter Pan by the Aussie director PJ Hogan, only a month before its release, after objecting to sharing royalties from the sale of merchandise with the hospital. (ANI)

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