After previously seeing the fantastic work of Mischief in their ‘The Play That Goes Wrong‘, I had an idea of what to expect from Peter Pan Goes Wrong. But yet somehow it still enabled me to be surprised and highly entertained by the on stage. But let’s stay in the moment with this one. Peter Pan Goes Wrong is NOT a pantomime (oh yes it.. no). It is definitely not. But just like it’s sister performance of The Play That Goes Wrong, I found myself having to indicate to my company that the play had started long before the house lights went down. This time ‘Trevor’ was well up into the audience business looking for his lost hammer.. meanwhile other cast members are either on stage or around the stage. It’s hard to talk about this kind of a play without presenting spoilers, but to be fair there’s nothing in this review that you wouldn’t find elsewhere either.
The seats we had for this performance were perfect, well mostly. I booked the extra legroom tickets for the seats we saw last time we were at the Empire and they are good seats, no doubt about that. Your feet and toes are exposed to the likes of clumsy audience members not.. looking where they are going… more than once! But the view from the seats was really quite good. They were excellent!
Many of the gags during the show take good old Slapstick comedy to its extremes. There are props on stage which are there for simply a singular use. They sit there for the entire show unused then for a crucial split second of timing. There are long-running gags from the sound desk, a ‘beep beep’ for a cab that was initially mis-timed then repeats itself.. multiple times throughout the show getting the.. appropriate reaction from whichever cast member has lines at that time. The dog ‘Nana’.. getting stuck in the dog.. flap on more than one instance and of course the Narrator whose entrances and exits are not always.. to plan.
By far I thought the second half after the interval was the funniest. By the end it had me streaming in tears. The best part of the show for me was towards the conclusion of the show, where the rotating stage seems to go.. a little fast and Captain Hook is literally trying to keep up by staying in the part of the rotation that is facing the audience. He ends up literally running through each of the three stages and even up and over the top of the stage too. Although of course well planned and choreographed part of the show, you can’t help but think just for a moment if things are really going.. a little bit wrong.
Unfortunately now this run of Peter Pan Goes Wrong has ended at Liverpool Empire, but I am sure it will be back at some point. It’s tour now moves on to Southampton. What I didn’t realise is that ‘Peter Pan Goes Wrong’ is older than ‘The Play That Goes Wrong’ and just how much stuff that Mischief Productions have done before and after these two outstanding pieces of theatre… Their website is a treasure trove of comedy gold.
Wherever you are, find a ‘Goes Wrong’ show near you and go to it. Spend some extra money and get some good seats. You won’t be disappointed whatsoever. Unless.. well you don’t like laughing, or smiling, or giggling all the way home… I know there are those like that out there! While this doesn’t to me feel like the best review I’ve ever written, Peter Pan Goes Wrong gets an outstanding 10 out of 10 from me.
