Review: Greater Boston Stage Company gets everything right with THE PLAY THAT GOES WRONG

When it comes to the Cornley Polytechnic Drama Society production of “The Murder at Haversham Manor,” everything that can go wrong does.

As the play within the play at the heart of the Tony Award-winning comedy “The Play That Goes Wrong” – being given a belly-laugh-a-minute production at Greater Boston Stage Company through April 19 – that 1920s murder mystery devolves into mayhem as one mishap after another threatens to derail the performance.

What’s happening on the stage may be tragic for the hapless Drama Society, but that’s what makes the show such a delightful comic romp. The unplanned “tragedy” includes everything from an unconscious leading lady, unscripted malapropisms, and missed cues to a theatrical tsunami of prop problems, from sticking doors and collapsing floors to falling set pieces.

Co-written by Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer, and Henry Shields, three company members of the U.K.-based Mischief Theatre, the show premiered in London in 2012 before opening on Broadway, at the Lyceum Theatre, on April 2, 2017, winning the 2017 Tony Award for Best Scenic Design of a Play, and running through January 2019.

At GBSC, under the inspired direction of Tyler Rosati, it’s not just farce, it’s high-octane physical comedy and pure escapism – served up by a nimble cast led by Paul Melendy as Chris Bean, who plays Inspector Carter. Bean is not only an actor, he also does double duty – octuple really – as the show’s director, set and Costume Designer, prop artisan, voice coach, fight choreographer, box office manager, and press agent. Melendy – a memorable Man in Chair in “The Drowsy Chaperone” at Lyric Stage last spring – is a delight throughout.

Other standouts in the strong cast include Ceit Zweil as Annie, the beleaguered stage manager; a scene-stealing Sarah Gazdowicz as Sandra, who is always on the move, even when unconscious; Liam Grimaldi as the naive Max, a puppy-dog like performer who breaks the fourth wall to greet his parents from the stage; and Jeff Mahoney as the unflappable Trevor.

The Dramatic Society may think otherwise about its own production, but there is a lot that goes just right in GBSC’s “The Play That Goes Wrong,” including Danielle Ibrahim’s well-appointed and impressively rigged set, which is aided by David Allen Prescott’s cleverly adapted props and Katie Whittemore’s lighting design, and should be given its own special billing.

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