Displaying items by tag: Eric Amundson

The Chicago Metropolitan area has a soft spot for a beautiful disaster, and The Play That Goes Wrong delivers the kind of exquisitely engineered chaos that feels tailor‑made for this theater‑loving region. What begins as a straightforward 1920s whodunit quickly mutates into a full‑throttle demolition derby of missed cues, mutinous props, collapsing scenery, and actors clinging to their dignity by the frayed edges of their costumes. Still, this play-within-a-play has the Cornley Drama Society charging through their staging of Murder at Haversham Manor with heroic - if spectacularly misguided - determination, clinging to the illusion of control even as the entire production disintegrates with spectacular enthusiasm.

That staunch commitment - part boldness, part sheer delusion - is exactly where the comedy ignites. Each disaster tops the last, creating a giddy, snowballing momentum that captures the thrill of live theater at its most unpredictable: anything can happen, and in this gloriously unhinged production, absolutely everything does.

Now this wonderful wreckage has landed in the northwest suburbs, with Metropolis Performing Arts Centre in downtown Arlington Heights offering Chicago‑area audiences a prime view of just how fabulously wrong things can go - and how deliriously right it all becomes.

Adeptly directed by Jahanna McKenzie Miller, the production becomes a finely tuned symphony of disarray - each mishap landing with surgical precision, each failing set piece detonating like a perfectly timed punchline. What unfolds is a relentless cascade of comic disaster, the kind that sends laughter rolling through the audience in unstoppable waves and showcases just how artful a well‑executed trainwreck can be.

Ryan Armstrong (left) as Chris Bean / Inspector Carter and Ryan Michael Hamman as Max Bennett in The Play THat Goes Wrong at Metropolis Performing Arts Centre.

To pull off such a bang-bang comedy, it all starts with the cast - and we’ve got a good one here.

Ryan Armstrong leads the beautifully controlled bedlam with a performance steeped in delicious self‑importance, giving Chris Bean - director, actor, and self‑appointed guardian of “proper theatre” - a pompous grandeur that’s as funny as it is precise, while his turn as Inspector Carter unravels in a perfectly paced crescendo of exasperation. Eric Amundson’s Charles Haversham is a riot of physical comedy, playing a corpse who refuses to stay still (hilarious!), and Casey Ross leans into Thomas Colleymoore’s melodrama with booming gusto, turning every line into a wonderfully overwrought declaration.

David Blakeman’s Perkins is a standout of earnest incompetence, mangling lines and props with lovable sincerity, while Ryan Michael Hamman’s Max Bennett steals scenes with wide‑eyed enthusiasm, overacting and shameless audience‑wooing as Cecil Haversham and Arthur the Gardener.

Even the sound and light operator becomes a crucial player in the unfolding disorder. Richaun Stewart turns Trevor Watson into a wonderfully frayed bundle of barely contained madness, playing the chronically overtaxed tech operator whose deadpan, slow‑burn panic becomes one of the evening’s most dependable laugh generators. Teah Kiang Mirabelli dazzles as Florence Colleymoore, embodying Sandra Wilkinson’s diva bravado with such gleeful abandon that each unhinged beat lands bigger than the last.

Rounding out the cast, Natalie Henry turns Annie Twilloil into the production’s unlikely center of gravity in the second act, charting a sharp, hilarious rise from hesitant stagehand to full‑blown spotlight thief.

Together, this ensemble builds a beautifully calibrated disaster - each actor contributing a distinct flavor of chaos that makes the entire production detonate with joy.

And then there’s the set, an impressive spectacle in its own right. Scenic designer Angela Weber Miller, properties designer Gigi Wendt, and technical director David Moreland push the production well beyond a typical farce, each adding a distinct layer of precision and controlled mishaps. The set functions as a full-fledged character, engineered to collapse, misfire, and betray the actors with such precision that its breakdowns become part of the comedy’s rhythm. Each wobbling wall, treacherous platform, and ill-timed malfunction gives the performers a fresh obstacle to hurl themselves against, turning physical comedy into a kind of athletic endurance test. The design doesn’t just support the charade - it actively conspires in it, creating a living, booby‑trapped environment that amplifies every pratfall and heightens the sense that the entire world of the play is gleefully turning against its inhabitants.

Written by Henry Lewis, Henry Shields and Jonathan Sayer, the Olivier Award-winning The Play That Goes Wrong is the kind of theatrical joyride that reminds audiences why live performance is irresistible: it’s unpredictable, it’s explosive, and it’s crafted with such precision that the turmoil becomes its own kind of art. This production delivers laugh after laugh through fearless physical comedy, razor‑sharp timing, and a cast fully committed to the magnificent meltdown unfolding around them. It’s the rare show that guarantees a good time - whether you’re a seasoned theatre goer or someone who just needs a night of pure, cathartic laughter.

For tickets and/or more show information, visit https://www.metropolisarts.com/event/the-play-that-goes-wrong/. Through March 29^th.

Recommended.

Tickets: Regular $49, Preview $35, Students $25
Pay What You Can: February 25, 7:30 pm
Previews: Evenings, February 25 – February 27. Matinee, February 28.
Opening: February 28, 7:30 pm

This review is proudly shared with our friends at www.TheatreInChicago.com.

Ever since my folks saw the Tony-winning production of Big River on Broadway when I was little and brought home the soundtrack on vinyl, the Roger Miller-penned musical has been my favorite. It not only acted as a gateway for young me to become a fan of Broadway, but it also introduced me at an early age to Miller’s and others’ classic songwriting, and to the story of Huckleberry Finn that I’d then revisit so many times in classrooms and libraries and pop culture. So, I’m always excited when there’s a production of the show, all these years later.

I was especially excited when, a few months back, I learned of Big River’s current production—now through June 11—at Mercury Theater, who have become one of my favorite companies in the past couple years, for their talent, for their show selection, and for the joy and heart that go into each of those shows. This production, by Mercury’s Artistic Director Christopher Chase Carter, did not disappoint.

The theater itself is always charming—a turn-of-the-century silent movie house ready to transport you someplace else. The set, 19^th-century Missouri on the banks of the Mississippi, by Jacqueline and Richard Penrod, completed the time travel. And as the show began, so did the narrators—Marcus Jackson (as charming as he was last year in Mercury’s Priscilla) as Mark Twain and newcomer Eric Amundson as Huck. The setting, Marquecia Jordan’s costumes, and the grounding that this is, in fact, an old-timey story do nothing to take away from said story’s timelessness or its lessons for today.

Quick note on Huck Finn’s datedness—one choice for any production of Big River is whether or not to incorporate Twain’s original language. This production does so, which was initially shocking. But, not to speak for the director’s intent, I think that was the point.

Amundson is a strong lead—his vocals stronger than many Hucks I’ve heard, especially on “Waitin’ for the Light to Shine”—and a charismatic Finn, boyish but in command of the stage. He harmonizes beautifully with Twain’s and Big River’s other protagonist…and as any great production of this show needs, it’s his friend Jim who’s the real star.

That star here is Curtis Bannister. Bannister truly takes command of the stage—most of the time on the raft the two share, or on various river islands along their journey—with his presence, but also with his voice. The orchestra, conducted by Marques Stewart, slows the tempo of the show’s songs just a touch, making them slightly more soulful and less showtuney than Miller’s original. This plays into Bannister’s singing strengths, letting him investigate and investigate each song’s melody.

And what songs they are— “Muddy Water,” “River in the Rain,” and “Worlds Apart” are duets he shares with Amundson where their voices seamlessly mix, while Jim’s “Free at Last” beautifully ends the show, accompanied by members of the ensemble playing those still enslaved, still seeking freedom.

Perhaps the vocal highlight of this show is by ensemble member Isis Elizabeth, who turns the schoolmarmish hymn “How Blest We Are” into funereal gospel. Perhaps the most timeless of the songs here is “Guv’ment,” a screed against everything that wouldn’t be out of place in right-wing or reactionary media. Huck’s Pap is played less over-the-top and boisterous, by David Stobbe, than any other Pap I’ve seen. He didn’t play for laughs as much as for sympathy—it worked for me—but he completely went for the laughs as the King, who, accompanied by Gabriel Fries’ Duke, gives the show some levity at its darkest moments, their malaprops and Shakespearean gobbledygook and medicine show shenanigans a lot of fun.

The rest of the ensemble is every bit as great as casts at the Mercury always are. Cynthia Carter—who I’ve long enjoyed in Chicago theater; seriously, if her name is on the playbill I know I’m in for a good show—provides beautiful vocals. McKinley Carter—last seen as Mrs. White in Mercury’s Clue—is a character, as always, as Miss Watson. Amanda Handegan’s Mary Jane brings heartbreak to her songs. Callan Roberts’s Tom Sawyer is the aw-shucks fun and adventure that Twain first explored in that boy’s book. And March Marren brings slapstick and charm to their roles as Jo and the Young Fool. As good an ensemble as you’ll find, which is what I’ve come to expect at the Mercury Theater.

And this production, overall, is what I’ve come to expect at the Mercury Theater—a new like at a classic work, featuring Chicago’s finest talents sharing their voices, their creativity, their joy, and their soul, which they will be doing from now through June 11.