Reviewed by Malcolm Calder
The Mischief Theatre Production of
THE PLAY THAT GOES WRONG
By Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer and Henry Shields
GMG Productions & Stoddart Entertainment Group
Associate director – Anna Marshall
Resident director – Nick Purdie
With Olivia Charalambous, Edmund Eramiha, Tom Hayward, Stephanie Astrid John, Joe Kosky, Jonathan Martin, Jack Buchanan, Anthony Craig and Kira Josephson
ASB Waterfront Theatre, Auckland
Until 1 June
Reviewer Malcolm Calder
The crew were frantically seeking a missing dog called Winston (I thought that was pretty funny from the outset), couldn’t find a missing CD, contending with a tricky door that wouldn’t latch, dealing with a floorboard that seemed have a mind of its own and contending with a mantlepiece wouldn’t mantle. All this before the show had even started.
Their crew’s efforts were entirely unsuccessful of course and the litany of woes continued once things got underway. But the teddibly English lads and lasses of the fictitious Cornley Polytechnic Drama Society struggled on in their efforts to ensure their eminently forgettable murder-mystery actually took place, with nowhere near understanding their own characters or, it seemed at times, even the plot. Not to mention a set that seemed intent on total disintegration. Their efforts certainly did go wrong and they eventually staggered to a dis-assembled conclusion.
However that’s not what The Play That Went Wrong is all about. Rather, it uses the context of an amateur theatre production to very quickly hit the spot demonstrating both subtle and in-your-face comic writing, exquisite nuance and a mature command of the farce-wrapped-in-slapstick idiom whilst totally demolishing the fourth wall.
Lewis, Sayer and Shields, formed Mischief Theatre in 2008 and created The Play That Went Wrong while still studying at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art. Originally titled The Murder Before Christmas, their production opened initially on the Edinburgh Fringe, enjoyed enormous success, moved to a pub on London and then quickly transferred to the West End. It has been winning accolades around the world ever sinceand has even spawned a range of not unrelated television spinoffs.
This cast is very much an ensemble. In performance they consummately demonstrate a broad-ranging set of physical theatre skills, demonstrate the importance of timing in making these work and do pretty well in convincing the audience that this is a collection of loosely-linked, impromptu standup snatches despite being a meticulously scripted work.
On Oening Night in Auckland I noticed a couple of rather precious looking luvvies in deep discussion during interval but they appeared to have missed the point entirely. Deep, thought-provoking, question-raising theatre this is not. Technique – yes! But, rather, if set in the context of a funeral parlour, not dissimilar gags, techniques and characters these writers could probably transmogrify it quite readily into The Funeral That Goes Wrong.
After any number of productions that occasionally take themselves a little too seriously, we seem to be on something of a comedy roll of late. Down at the water-side anyway. The Play That Goes Wrong is the second bout of hilarity in a row with another soon to follow.
New Zealand Arts Review 