Faux pas and foul play _{by Alessia Belsito-Riera}

Something suspicious has taken to the stage – there may even be a murderer in our midst. As the Cornley Polytechnic Drama Society prepares for opening night of their newest production The Murder at Haversham Manor, the hapless theatre troupe finds more faux pas than foul play in their 1920s murder mystery as lost props, forgotten lines, and poorly constructed scenery all conspire against the clumsy cast.

This is the scene of the crime when fast-paced farce The Play That Goes Wrong crashes into Wellington’s Opera House from the 19^th to the 27^th of April. Co-written by Mischief Theatre company members Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer, and Henry Shields and originally directed by Mark Bell, The Play That Goes Wrong celebrates a decade of disasters and a list of achievements that include an Olivier, a Tony, and a Molière award, plus eight million tickets sold and 6.3 million views online.

In April, six Aussies and five Kiwis will bring the longest-running West End comedy to the Southern Hemisphere for a night of madcap mayhem and crazed catastrophe. In the director’s seat is Amy Milburn, who zoomed into the Antipodes from the UK and was delighted with the extraordinary array of talent she encountered.

In the pivotal role of Chris Bean, the newly appointed director of the Cornley Drama Society, is Jonathan Martin fresh from a sold-out season of Baz Luhrmann’s Strictly Ballroom in Christchurch. Joe Kosky of hit stage musical School of Rock, Shrek The Musical, and Come From Away fame fills the roll of Robert, while multi-award-winning singer, actor, teacher, puppeteer, and improviser Stephanie Astrid John joins the cast as Sandra. In the role of terrified-turned-stage-boss Annie is Olivia Charalambous, joined by Eds Eramiha as Cornley Drama Society’s stage manager Trevor, Sebastiano Pitruzzello as Max, Brodie Masini as Jonathan, and Tom Hayward as Dennis.

A finely tuned farce featuring Buster Keaton-inspired slapstick delivered with split-second timing and ambitious daring, The Play That Goes Wrong is theatre done perfectly right.