By Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer & Henry Shields
Directed by Fred Sullivan Jr.
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Spotify Playlist: The Play That Goes Wrong
RUNNING TIME: Approximately 2 hours and 10 minutes, including a 15-minute intermission.
2022/23 Season Sponsors:
Paul Kastner
G. Lee & Diana Humphrey
Production Sponsor: Joe Richard & RenÉ Morrissette
Director Sponsor: Fred Sullivan, Jr. Sponsored by Sam & Gretchen Shubrooks
Cast Sponsor: Ruth Rotundo Whitney
Set Designer Sponsor: Mary & Larry Shaw
Summary:
“Break a leg!” takes on a whole new meaning for a woefully misguided troupe of players at the Cornley University Society’s opening night performance of The Murder at Haversham Manor. An unconscious leading lady, a corpse who can’t play dead, a ruffled detective, and a word-mangling butler (among others) must battle against technical gaffes, forgotten lines, and sabotaging scenery in a quest to arrive all in one piece at the final curtain call. Part Monty Python, part Sherlock Holmes, all mayhem—this 1920s whodunit is disastrously delightful.
This production uses strobe lighting and fog effects. One live simulated gunshot in Act 2.
* Member of Actors’ Equity Association, the Union of Professional Actors and Stage Managers in the United States
** Represented by United Scenic Artists, Local USA 829 of the IATSE
° Stage Directors and Choreographers Society
Help Lyric Stage Care for our Neighbors!
During the run of The Play That Goes Wrong, we will be collecting personal hygiene items for our friends who reside at 140 Clarendon as part of the affordable housing units supported by Beacon Communities.We will be accepting items such as soap, shampoo/conditioner, underwear for men and women (all sizes), socks, toothpaste, toothbrushes, dental floss, lotion, hand sanitizer, feminie hygiene products, shaving cream, razors, toilet paper, hair brushes, Q-tips, and tissues.
Before the show, drop off your items in Kumba Library located on the same floor as the theater.
Thank you for helping us help our neighbors!
Press & Reviews:
‘The Play That Goes Wrong’ is just right | Boston Herald | Jed Gottlieb
“It’s a love letter to the theater, it’s a love letter to actors,” Sullivan said. “It has magic to it. There’s an innocence to it… I dare people not to be charmed by it.”
So much goes right in Lyric’s uproarious ‘The Play That Goes Wrong’ | The Boston Globe | Terry Bryne
"The true star of the show is scenic designer Peter Colao, who, while working within the confines of the script’s very specific requirements, must protect the Lyric Stage cast (and audience) from danger even as he allows the set to collapse all around them."
"The Play That Goes Wrong" Review | GBH - Morning Edition | Jared Bowen
"The comedy shines through in this production, Bowen says, offering much-needed humor for audiences."
"The Play That Goes Wrong" Review | METRMag.com | Kevin T. Baldwin
"Through the magnificent collective effort of the Lyric cast, the comedy gets the volume turned all the way up to "11." Without Peter Colao's set and Fred Sullivan, Jr.'s expert stage direction, the planned "failures" incorporated into the script would never fire off as brilliantly as they do."
" Without a doubt, this production is truly, completely and disastrously hysterical as well as laugh out loud funny."
" If pratfalls, mishaps, and chaos are your game, “The Play That Goes Wrong” presents them artfully."
" Toss in ticklish corpses, unconscious leading ladies, multifarious miscues, and technical gaffes all orchestrated by virtuoso director Fred Sullivan, Jr. who knows a thing or two about the precision required to make this bedlam a thing of beauty– and you’ve got a winner."
