[1] The ballet is about a little boy who falls asleep at the American Museum of Natural History and dreams of people he knew as animals.
Oliver Pendleton Percy III, a little boy, falls asleep during a visit to the American Museum of Natural History.
[2] Christopher Wheeldon and John Lithgow met in 2002 when the two worked on the musical Sweet Smell of Success as choreographer and actor respectively.
[2] The ballet is set in the American Museum of Natural History, which Wheeldon visits frequently due to its "amazing mix of the grotesque and the wonderful".
[5] Lithgow returned for the New York City Ballet's appearance at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center in July 2003,[6] and at the 2005 revival, for which he took time off from the musical Dirty Rotten Scoundrels to do so.