SF Weekly
Review by Michael Scott Moore
When he was young, for some reason, local playwright Trevor Allen wanted to be Peter Pan. He got a little older and realized that the best way to be Peter Pan was to work as a dress-up character at Disneyland. So he rented a sad, roach-ridden apartment and started as a lowly breakfast-shift character outside the park, graduated to Pluto (inside the park), then tried out for Peter Pan but fell in love with the slim girl playing Alice and wound up working with her in a figurative Wonderland, as the Mad Hatter. Allen relates the whole story in a perky, Mouseketeer style that contrasts well with his sordid material. Rules at Disney are famously strict, but he gives us the bored drug users in Peter Pan's coterie, the old-school midget in the Donald Duck suit who talks like a boxing promoter, and the slim girl (OK, it was Alice) who gets busted for fucking Dick Tracy in "partial costume" on the Matterhorn. Allen's glittery-eyed manner keeps the stories from degrading into a stale disillusionment-with-Disney routine, but it also keeps a few of his punch lines from landing: Sometimes you wish for a little more bite. Still, he has strong solo-performer chops and a keen sense of the pathos underlying the Happiest Place on Earth. What do you do, for example, when a hairless 7-year-old wearing a Make-A-Wish Foundation T-shirt hugs you through the hot felt armor of your dog costume and says, "Bye, Pluto! Don't forget my birthday!"—and you don't have authorization to speak? Good God.
November 27, 2002
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“The man behind the mask: Disneyland not so magic for people in the furry suits”
Profile by Chad Jones for the Oakland Tribune
“It's a Small Job After All: Trevor Allen uncovers Disneyland with warmth, style, and tremendous humor”
Review by Lisa Drostova for the East Bay Express
“Sensitive Trevor Allen came of age at ‘the happiest place on earth.’ He tells his story in the thoroughly engaging Working for the Mouse onstage at the Exit Theatre”
Review by Leslie Katz for the San Francisco Examiner
“Who fucked Dick Tracy on the Matterhorn? Find out in this sad, sordid Disneyland memoir”
Review by Michael Scott Moore for the SF Weekly
“Trevor Allen recounts his stint as a costumed character at Disneyland in his solo show Working for the Mouse”
Review by James Sullivan for the San Francisco Chronicle