The Hope Theatre – until 7 June 2025
Reviewed by Claire Roderick
4****
Toby Hampton and Matt Ballantyne’s funeral farce is great fun.
Burke & Sons Family Funerals has been run into the ground and is almost six feet under thanks to Regina’s (Gabrielle Nellis-Pain) crackpot/genius schemes. Younger sister Harriet (Laurel Marks) can just about cope with the alliterative funeral packages, but when she finds out about Regina’s plan to open Jolly Gina’s Gin Bar & Spa in the loft above the funeral parlour, it’s the final straw.
With bankruptcy looming, Harriet, ably assisted/hindered by new intern Malcolm (Gabriel Fogarty-Graveson) has no choice but to flog the fanciest funerals possible to the bereaved. Identity mix-ups and blackmail lead to the firm arranging two funerals at the same time, but Regina leaps into action and concocts a plan to run both, dragging Harriet and Malcolm along with her.
The writing is darkly funny and deeply daft with larger-than-life characters, but the codependent relationship of the clashing sisters is the touching heart of the play as we watch stoic, reliable Harriet deal with the fallout from Regina’s conveyor belts of “inspirational” business plans and relationships. Nellis-Pain is marvellously manic as Regina, reminiscent of the best Ealing comedy schemers, but with a brilliantly modern anarchic edge. Gabriel Fogarty-Graveson is hilarious as the sweet but constantly befuddled Malcolm, and Laurel Marks is the perfect foil for the pair – her wincing and head shaking as she is bubbling with frustration seeing mistakes and disasters looming but trying to keep calm is as funny as the physical nonsense surrounding her. Molly-Rose Treves is hilarious as Mrs Clarke – a grieving widow with designs on Malcolm -, the awful Lady Farrington and the eccentric Reverend Plumpkin.
Toby Hampton also directs, and the pace is perfectly judged as the situation snowballs and chaos ensues. The laughs are non-stop and the cast’s timing is sublime. Grave Mistake is gloriously silly and unmissable entertainment.