Ali Baba is a character from medieval Arabic literature. He is described in the adventure tale of Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves.
This story has been used as a popular story pantomime plot such as in the pantomime/musical Chu Chin Chow(1916). Like many other folk tales frequently adapted for children, the original tale is darker and more violent than the more familiar bowdlerised versions. Popular perception of Ali Baba, and the way he is treated in popular media, sometimes implies that he was the leader of the "Forty Thieves": in the story he is actually an honest man whom fortune enables to take advantage of the thieves' robberies.