(seen at the afternoon preview performance on 19th April 2025)
In 2019, Mischief Theatre had, what the monkey felt was, a disappointing season at the Vaudeville Theatre, London. New work seemed forced and repetitive.
Prior to that, “The Comedy About A Bank Robbery” was re-written so often that the monkey’s early published opinion was redundant within weeks. Despite the rewrites it never lived up to the longevity or fond appeal of earlier work, and it felt like the glorious originality of the plucky group of graduates who created jobs for themselves, and a global phenomenon, was over.
The lengthy break has done the team the world of good. The monkey is overwhelmingly delighted to announce that Mischief Theatre have grown up, matured, and now deliver a new show as good as “The Play That Goes Wrong” and “Peter Pan Goes Wrong” – perhaps even edging both for emotional depth and ingenious construction.
To reveal anything of Lewis and Shields’s insanely clever (insanely as a noun, not adjective) plot would be to spoil it for future audiences.
David Farley’s design is vibrant, Matt DiCarlo never wastes a movement or scene, and there has to be extra applause for the entire stage and technical team who keep the thing (almost always – stuck body) working with immaculate timing.
Many of the original cast return. Henry Lewis never fails to raise a laugh with a mere change of expression indicating a forming thought.
Henry Shields has deepened his character acting, realising that stillness is a powerful comedic weapon - and unleashing it on Adele James allows her to return fire with equal ability.
Nancy Zamit and Dave Hearn are a deeply bonded double-act in all senses. While it is a grave mistake to let Zamit sing (Hearn does his best, but), she brings terrific breadth to the relationship, making the final moments even more electric between the pair.
If Chris Leask and Charlie Russell as the other pairing deliver a Russian accent considerably more malodorous than melodious (the monkey is familiar with the real thing), they lean into the hilarious second act happenings with a gusto outweighing the first act confusion.
So, no spoilers. The awkward opening scene – trailed at the 2025 Royal Variety Performance – is now tighter and actually funny. A bit of a dip follows for 15 minutes, after that, fasten your seatbelts, loosen your jeans belts and let your bellies vibrate with the gales of laughter these hapless agents of mirth will generate.
