After 496 days of being closed, Theatre Royal Brighton is buzzing with excitement again as the front of house staff welcome back their enthusiastic audience with a Gala Night performance of the Olivier Award winning smash hit comedy The Play That Goes Wrong.
When you’re going to see a Mischief Theatre production, arriving early at the theatre is highly recommended as, not only is the atmosphere electric at every performance, the action on stage begins well before the advertised start time of the show as well.
The audience are assembling to witness the Cornley Polytechnic Drama Society production of Susie H.K. Brideswell’s Murder at Haversham Manor, the play that is The Play That Goes Wrong – as becomes very obvious when, with just minutes to go before the show begins, two incompetent stage technicians are repairing the (apparently) rather flimsy set – and dealing with a very temperamental door.
Before the play starts, we meet the show’s director, designer and star, Chris Bean, who reminds us all of casting issues that lead to their production of the musical Cat, funding problems that affected James and the Peach and even the colour-blind designer that positively ruined their production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.
The drama then begins with an ill-timed lighting cue that reveals the “corpse” walking across the stage and preparing to lay out on the chaise and, following that, the production soon descends into complete farce. The set falls to pieces, the acting is either wooden or completely over the top, there is infighting among the cast, the poor “corpse” keeps getting assaulted and, above all, the entire production is absolutely hilarious.
It is slapstick comedy at its very best as doors don’t open or don’t close, wall decorations keep falling down, actors are concussed, and Nigel Hook’s incredible set, which conceals so many tricks that unfold as the performance goes along, rapidly becomes one of the stars of the show!
As we have a play within a play, crediting the casting is not easy, but here goes. Tom Bulpett is Chris Bean, who is Inspector Carter, the character who tries to hold the murder mystery play together as well as he possibly can but, as events conspire against him, he soon becomes reminiscent of Basil Fawlty at his manic best.
Playing Thomas Colleymore and his sister Florence Colleymore, Robert Grove and Sandra Wilkinson (in turn played by Leonard Cook and April Hughes) seem to get the lion’s share of the more physical aspects of the comedy and, between them, they have to contend with sword fighting, fist fighting, collapsing scenery and even being dragged unconscious through a window.
Jonathan Harris (Sean Carey) and Max Bennett (Edi De Melo) are the brothers Charles and Cecil Haversham and, considering that one of them starts the production as the corpse, both have a great deal of input into the show, providing the unexpected twist (which is anything but unexpected) as the production reaches its climax.
Dennis Tyde (Edward Howells) features as the butler, Perkins who, together with Stage Manager Annie Twilloil (Laura Kirman) and Sound / Lighting operator Trevor Watson (Gabriel Paul), complete the team responsible for the murder mystery. All three have pivotal roles to play and, as one might expect, all three fail miserably in that endeavour.
As with all murder mystery plays there is the big reveal at the end but, with chaos reining supreme, destruction all around and the audience howling with laughter, I couldn’t tell you with any degree of certainty exactly who it was that “dunnit” – I think I had better go and see it again!
Mischief Theatre Company have created a frantic paced comedy, with the superb timing needed to make this kind of slapstick physical comedy work, and feature a multi-talented cast who give their all to deliver the amazing energy and stamina necessary to keep the audience roaring with laughter from start to finish.
***** Five Stars