The Play That Goes Wrong brings farcical mishaps to Granville Island, August 13 to 30
Black Box Theatre Co. presents the production that has garnered wide acclaim since its 2012 premiere in London
The Play That Goes Wrong.
Black Box Theatre Co. presents The Play That Goes Wrong from August 13 to 30 at the Waterfront Theatre
MANY ACTORS DREAD the day even a minor mishap occurs onstage. But what if the whole point of a production was for things to go sideways in every way imaginable?
The Play That Goes Wrong does exactly that. It’s essentially a play within a play, set on opening night of a production called “The Murder at Haversham Manor”. The plot at hand—a half-baked version of Agatha Christie’s The Mousetrap—provides ample opportunities for the overconfident actors of the Cornley Drama Society to forget the most elementary lines, suffer outlandish injuries, and lose props who knows where.
The production was written by Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer, and Henry Shields of Mischief Theatre Company, and has seen wide success since its 2012 premiere in London. A New York Times critic who saw The Play That Goes Wrong in 2015 called it “an unexpected, gut-busting hit” and “one of those breakneck exercises in idiocy that make you laugh till you cry”.
Here in Vancouver, Black Box Theatre Co. is bringing The Play That Goes Wrong to the Waterfront Theatre on Granville Island with a cast of local actors. Even the production website plays into all the farcical happenings; the cast and crew page proudly proclaims that it stars “absolutely no one you would recognize”.
A special preview performance will take place August 13 at 6:30 pm, with all proceeds going to support the Canuck Place Children’s Hospice. Opening night is August 14 and the play runs to August 30. ![]()
Emily Lyth is a Vancouver-based writer and editor who graduated from Langara College’s Journalism program. Her decade of dance training and passion for all things food-related are the foundation of her love for telling arts, culture, and community stories.
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