Sheffield Lyceum Theatre – until Saturday 24 February 2024
Reviewed by Amarjeet Singh
5*****
Mischief, the creators of ‘The Play That Goes Wrong’, now into its 10th year, are still wowing audiences with its guaranteed mayhem, brings us the rather delicious ‘Peter Pan Goes Wrong’. The gags in this production are aimed at a slightly more grown-up audience with its sauce and sea faring theme, yet it’s still cleverly crafted with its deceptively simple but ingenious premise: of a show that falls apart before its even started, in the most startling and hilarious fashion.
The story revolves around the Cornley Youth Theatre, attempting to stage a well-known children’s classic, Peter Pan. Its most definitely not a pantomime, oh yes it is, oh no it isn’t. There is in fighting, romance, affairs, terrible acting, props which appear to operate on their own. Sets which have not passed any kind of health and safety test and spookly self-playing audition tapes which reveal the true motivations behind some of the players.
The cast were outstanding, never missing a beat, running around the theatre before the performance had started causing chaos and mayhem and a real stir of excitement amongst the audience. Jake Burgum played Trevor, the put-upon stagehand wonderfully, who had to give more of himself then he had anticipated. Jack Michael Stacey played the pompous and highly strung director Chris to perfection, his breaking of the fourth wall and sparring with the audience was a delight. Matthew Howell’s Robert shined as the mumbling pirate and as the sultry shadow. Clark Devlin was brilliant as gormless, line-fed Dennis. Ciara Morris plays Wendy Darling earnestly which is the right balance in light of the chaos surrounding her.
Gareth Tempest played as suave Peter Pan, his acrobatic spinning skills were impressive. Rosemarie Akwafo made us squirm as calamitous Lucy who whilst overcoming stage fright encountered a series of barriers of a different nature. Theo Toksvig-Stewart’s Max is snap snap snappy, making the most of his roles of Michael and The Crocodile, but why shouldn’t he be…his uncle paid heavily for them. An absolute stand out for me was Jamie Birkett, she brought oodles of physical comedy to all her roles and was the mistress of the quick-change gag, smashing it as Mrs Darling, Maid Lisa and Tinker Bell, as well as having the most beautiful singing voice.
Simon Scullion’s set is incredible, revolving from scene to scene which amps up to a frenetic pace in the finale. Adam Meggido’s direction in the energetic, high stakes end sequence is an experience to behold. This show is packed to the rafters with gags galore and not a moment to be bored, just pure silliness and unadulterated fun from beginning to it’s explosive, and I mean explosive end