by Joanne Engelhardt
A play within a play within a play within a…
“The Play That Goes Wrong” isn’t quite that comically confusing, but it’s definitely a somewhat circuitous piece of slapstick that kept last Friday’s opening night crowd lapping up the zany antics happening onstage.
Even before the curtain opens (actually there is no visible curtain to open), actors wander up and down the two stairways in the audience area chatting up people in their upper-crust British accents and handing out fliers about their missing dog, “Winston.”
Meanwhile, way upstage, two female crew members are busy putting the finishing touches on a mantel in the large living room where (nearly) all the action happens.
According to the fake part of the official program, this is a play called “The Murder at Haversham Manor,” put on by the Cornley Drama Society. But don’t believe it for a moment. That statement is about as phony as the painted bookcase which you just know is going to swivel around sometime during the performance.
Lying prone on a deep blue velvet chaise at centerstage is Jonathan (Fred Pitts), who apparently is dead…until he isn’t. No, this corpse twitches, burps, coughs, winces when someone sits on him, and eventually picks himself up and walks out the door.
Nevertheless, a police officer (Michael Champlin) arrives to investigate the murder and discovers there may be more than one death and a multitude of suspects.
There’s beauteous Sandra (a terrific Lucy Swinson), his fiancée, who is actually fooling around with Jonathan’s brother Max (dapper, perennially smiling Andrew Cope). Meanwhile, Trevor (River Bermudez Sanders), a Duran Duran-addicted sound designer in a booth high above the stage, nonchalantly agrees or nixes what the actors want him to do.
Annie (a quirky, hilarious performance by Vivienne Truong) is called on to do the most outlandish stunts such as holding her arms through a wall to hold up candlesticks when the mantel falls apart. Later, after Sandra supposedly dies, Annie is told she must play Sandra’s role, so she puts on her dress (which is too large), and her wig which is way too small. The two women later get into some backstage scuffles that realistically look as if they are roundly beating up each other.
Perhaps the biggest applause should go to the carpentry crew that put together the amazing set designed by Kevin Davies and Eric Olson. There’s that bookcase crammed full of books that is not what it seems, and an offstage “elevator” that mysteriously transports characters up to a small second-story study in clouds of colorful smoke. The study is also the setting for some of the most incredible acrobatic tricks performed by several of the actors when it starts to slide downward.
It’s probably best not to bother yourself with trying to understand the plot because…well, that’s not really the point. Instead, just go with the flow, laugh your head off and try not to get in the way of flying objects—or maybe bodies!
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“The Play That Goes Wrong” by Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer, and Henry Shields. Director: Steve Muterspaugh. Scenic Designers: Kevin Davies and Eric Olson. Costume Designer: Nolan Miranda. Lighting Designer: Pamila Gray. Sound Designer: Jeff Mockus. Properties Designer: Jenna Forder. Intimacy Director: Maya Herbsman. Fight Captain: Paul Henry.
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