Peter Pan Goes Wrong – Leeds Grand Theatre

Music: Rob Falconer

Writer: Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer & Henry Shields

Director: Adam Meggido

Mischief Theatre brings its well-known brand of chaos and ruin to the Leeds Grand, leaving audiences with aching faces and split sides.

Now known for their BBC TV series The Goes Wrong Show, Mischief are well at home in the theatre. Founded in 2008 by a group of acting graduates from LAMDA, Mischief has achieved unprecedented success. Scoring successful West End and Broadway runs, Christmas specials and having live performances adapted for screen.

Mischief’s West End productions have included The Play That Goes Wrong (surprisingly still at the Duchess Theatre since 2014), Peter Pan Goes Wrong, Mischief Movie Nightand The Comedy About A Bank Robbery, as well as working with Penn & Teller to create Magic Goes Wrong and their coming-of-age comedy, Groan Ups.

As a framework for performances, the company have created the fictional Cornley Polytechnic Society, a group of amateur dramatic performers whose enthusiasm far exceeds their talent and technical capacity.

Even as the audience enters the frantic amateur stage management team is racing around the building looking for lost hammers and trying to fix faulty lights, and after much fuss and hilarity, finally, Chris Bean (Jack Michael Stacey) and Robert Grove (Matthew Howell) step forward to introduce the show.

What follows is a fairly faithful re-telling of J. M. Barrie’s Peter Pan, except that everything that can go wrong, does go wrong, and in the most hilarious ways.

Clark Devlin’s Dennis, playing John Darling, Mermaid and Mr Smee, has failed to learn his lines in time so he is issued with a state-of-the-art headset so he can have his lines fed to him. Inevitably the headset breaks and he often ends up repeating local radio stations or at one point a warring couple’s argument. Devlin remains deadpan throughout and manages to deliver all his dialogue like he is genuinely surprised by everything he needs to say.

There is much humour taken from the cast’s multi-rolling, particularly with Annie (Jamie Birkett) who plays Mrs Darling, Liza, Tinkerbell and Curly. In the opening scene she switches between characters at breakneck speed resulting in costumes flapping open and even being caused halfway through a change.

There is a strangeness to watching the touring cast if you know the original Mischief gang. At times it feels as though the actors are impersonating the original cast playing the roles, and the humour doesn’t seem to flow as naturally. However, the humour draws you back in from this disassociation quickly.

The set design from Simon Scullion is nothing short of brilliant. It reeks of amateur dramatics with wonky flat sets that flap around. However, it is cleverly built to break in the correct places, and safely so the audience feels comfortable enough to laugh.

The true genius of the set design shines through when the revolve “breaks” and is left in a never-ending spin with a ship wobbling backwards and forwards, fires starting and a paramedic caught in the crossfire. This is pants wettingly funny!

All in all, audiences should be rushing to the Grand Theatre for a hilarious night of fun and entertainment. There certainly can’t be any disappointment, just be careful you don’t sit on a hammer.

Runs until Saturday 20th January 2024