Comedy among chaos

Green Bay East students will open the curtain on their production of The Play That Goes Wrong this week — a show that follows a local theater company as their production of a murder mystery descends further and further into chaos.

“It’s a show inside of a show,” said Joseph Kolze, who plays Thomas Colleymoore in the show. “The Cornley Drama Society is trying to put on this show for pretty much anyone who wants to come, but nothing they have ever done has gone to plan. They’ve had ideas of doing shows, but they’ve never had the budget and they’ve never had the people to do them. That’s how we get their jokes with The Seven Tall, Broad Gentleman instead of The Seven Dwarves and James, Where’s Your Peach? Instead of James and the Giant Peach. They’re trying to put on a wonderful show — the best show they’ve ever put on before. They have a bigger budget and they have the perfect number of people on the show, but everything goes wrong. Nothing seems to go right for the Cornley Drama Society.”

The most difficult part of the show? Grace Kennedy, who plays Perkins in the show, said it’s making sure that the things that go wrong “look flawless and like it’s the first time happening — making the audience believe, ‘Oh my gosh! What was that? Why did that fall?”

A significant amount of work has gone into making sure that things go wrong in the right way and that the characters’ reactions are believable.

“Everything has to be planned, even if they’re going wrong,” Kolze said. “Even something just falling off the wall… The crew almost has to know exactly what they’re doing more than the actors do.”

“We’re supposed to react like it’s gone perfectly, but then just the night of the performance it’s gone wrong,” said Jonathan Ahumada Gallardo, who plays Charles Haversham in the show. “We’re supposed to react to it going wrong and technically stay in character, but not in a way.”

When it comes to characters, though, the cast had no problem settling into their roles.

“I feel like the show is cast very well,” said Astrou Gartzke, who plays Cecil Haversham in the show. “Everyone was able to step in and just embrace who their character was… I think the show’s really come together and everyone’s really had a lot of fun, and I think the audience will feel that.”

“Everyone feels like they fit so well into their roles,” Ahumada Gallardo said. “It feels like at some points, we’re not acting. We’re just being ourselves within the role.”

“The people that we have this year, in general, they play very well,” said Liam Renquin, who plays Inspector Carter in the show. “The people coming back played very good, dramatic roles last year. But a lot of them are naturally funny people… It was just kind of a natural next step. A lot of people proved their chops last year and I think this is another chance to spread our wings.”

This show is a complete change of pace from last year’s show, Radium Girls, which followed the story of the young women who were exposed to dangerous levels of radiation while working with radium as face-dial painters, ultimately laying the groundwork for the creation of the Occupational Health and Safety Act (OSHA) that still exists today.

“The energy is definitely different,” Gartzke said. “Everyone always finds their own ways to have fun, but this year everything’s fun. Last year, there was more focus on the historical parts and keeping everything accurate, but this year we had some creative freedom so we’re going to take the show and do what we want as long as the overall message is still there.”

With so many opportunities for creative freedom and any number of things that could go wrong at any moment, only one thing is certain for audiences coming to see The Play That Goes Wrong: “You never know what’s next,” said Bridget Clarkson, who plays Florence Colleymoore in the show. “It’s definitely a show that keeps you guessing.”

Tickets and more information about the show can be found on the Fine Arts Institute at East High’s Facebook page.