The Play That Goes Wrong (NYC) NYC Reviews and Tickets

"It’s official. We can laugh again. Time to go see The Play That Goes Wrong. Director Matt DiCarlo has let the cast loose on this wonderful farce with but one instruction: go for it. No laugh remains un-milked; no scene un-stolen; no wink un-winked. Not even the furniture is safe. At the zoo they tell you not to feed the animals, but for the actors of The Cornley University Drama Society, it is just the opposite. A steady diet of laughter and applause facilitates the breeding program. Thus the gags have gags, and double takes have given birth to triplets."
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"My reactions ranged between thinking this play was exhaustingly funny to finding it just plain exhausting...Everything is pitched so aggressively, you wind up feeling as battered as the ensemble. I propose putting your rational mind into sleep mode, the better to savor tickling images of order-inverting bizarreness, straight out of Dada, in which suddenly nothing is in its customary place or being used for its customary purpose. There's a wild, redeeming poetry in such anarchy."
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"Depending on your tolerance for ceaseless slapstick, 'The Play That Goes Wrong' will either have you rolling in the aisles or rolling your eyes. It is certainly a marvel of coordination: The imported British cast deftly navigates the pitfalls of Nigel Hook’s ingeniously tumbledown set, and overacts with relish...But you may find it rather exhausting...It struggles to sustain interest in its series of absurdly unfortunate events. The show must go on, yes, but must it go on quite so long?"
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"It’s so ridiculous it makes you feel almost ashamed to love it...The tumble from slapstick into absurdity is the best part of 'The Play That Goes Wrong'...Not that the stage tricks aren’t fun...But those tricks and carefully rehearsed ineptitudes are not, in the end, deeply satisfying, however well achieved they are...Though they let too much air out of the concept, shriveling somewhat its effectiveness and diminishing its buoyancy, I laughed at all of those things."
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"An intricately planned fiasco...It takes incredible skill to pull off such bungling, and Mark Bell’s production nails every spit take and sight gag...Where Frayn went for three dimensions, Mischief Theatre settles for two—but that’s enough to sustain both acts, just barely. The show is pure comedic eye candy, and technically flawless. It’s closer to synchronized swimming or fight choreography than to its more contemplative theatrical cousins, revealing almost nothing about the human condition."
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"The show bears no small debt to Frayn’s classic farce, 'Noises Off,' but it pales by comparison...This effort is pure slapstick from first moment to last, and wears very thin over a two hour-plus running time...The production certainly fulfills its modest creative aspirations...There’s no paucity of wit to the proceedings, and Bell stages the action with clockwork precision...But for all the strenuous effort involved, the repetitive show evaporates in your mind the moment it concludes."
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"An immersive, hilarious evening...Admittedly, two hours of nonstop pandemonium gets exhausting, and even with the intriguing character development (or degeneration), the curtain comes as a bit of a relief. (You can only cringe so many times before getting a cramp.) But on the whole, 'The Play That Goes Wrong' is just right: A ridiculously entertaining disaster."
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"Under the go-for-broke direction of Mark Bell, its high-energy cast is comic gold and manages to sustain, with a never-ending series of diversionary tactics, its one-joke concept...It’s more lowbrow, interested in the gag and shameless in how it gets it: sometimes incredibly inventively, but sometimes going for the low-hanging fruit...Though it could benefit from some cutting, the production is an idiot’s delight...But it takes a while before the laughs come at full speed."
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