For 2 years of high school, I took stagecraft, and though it’s a class about building and learning how the stage comes together…I also saw the different plays and musicals the students were working on. Almost every class, whether 4th hour or 7th, students came in talking to Mrs. Glidwell, the theatre teacher, about the upcoming show. I could so easily see these students’ love and passion for theatre. I had the pleasure of going to see the last night of the spring show “The Play That Goes Wrong” and I knew beforehand that there was a talented cast and crew but this show reflected not only their passion for theatre but the hard work every person contributed. It exceeded my expectations.
The premise of the Play That Goes Wrong: High School Edition is that an extremely low-budget Cornley Polytechnic Drama Society has received a lot of money to stage the murder mystery play “The Murder At Haversham” yet they’re in over their heads. None of the effects go right despite their high budget. Most actors don’t know the lines, or entrances or are terrified of being on stage. Some parts of the set look great, are breaking, or are just not even done.
The first characters on stage as the show began were Perkins or Dennis (freshman Giovanni Cucchiaria) and Mary Colleymoore or Rachel (freshman Bella Dean) These two had such a good dynamic. There were moments with them that if you weren’t watching you would miss it. They would be doing something in the background whether it be facial expressions or play fighting because Dennis pronounced a word wrong. Again. Dean brought a great feel to the stage with a confident attitude and witty lines. One of my favorite scenes is with Mary Colleymoore and Cecil Haversham (senior Sam Ragone) They’re fighting over what happened to Charlie and Mary Colleymoore ends up pulling Cecil by his feet as he’s screaming and pleading for her to let go. She then abruptly stops and so does Cecil. She hits the pause button on the fight to open the door and then immediately goes back to screaming pulling him completely off stage. Such a great part.
Cucchiaria was running around and getting the other characters a delicious beverage or an item they needed. He had lines that he delivered so well that it made you laugh easily. The part where he continually is just bringing beverages that the actors clearly do not want as they spit it out every time made the theatre erupt with laughter.
Charlie Haversham (senior PJ Spear) would come out at the wrong times throughout the play and it was such a funny touch. As well as the fight between the two girls who played Florence (juniors Kaitlin Seim and Kendall Heckman) fighting for the spotlight was a very memorable part of the play. Ragone played Cecil as well as Max, who loves getting a reaction from the audience. Any time he did something for the audience it was true comedy. The rest of the cast who would come in or lurk in the background was perfect — it truly just showed that this play was going very wrong.
For the first time, PCHS theatre had an understudy — Charlotte Sweet and Finley Pennington both played Inspector Carter; Charlotte was the understudy filling in for Pennington on Tuesday and Thursday of the show week. The show I went to was with Pennington – I loved this character and Pennington did a lovely and I am sure Sweet was just as amazing.
The Play That Goes Wrong was about things not going according to plan but the people behind the scenes, the actors, and the crew did things right. An amazing spring play that showed the countless hours of hard work and love for this show.
