A Christmas Carol Goes Wrong

After last year's pratfalls with Peter Pan, the Cornley Polytechnic Drama Society have been banished from the BBC, who have decided to use professional actors for their recreation of A Christmas Carol starring Derek Jacobi.

However the inept amateur dramatic society ambushed the BBC production and staged their own version with Dame Diana Rigg providing the narration. She is the aunt of one of the members of the drama society.

Again the production was a shambolic travesty with actors having trouble remembering the lines, props not working, stage hands walking into shot and an actor trying to sabotage the production so he can play the lead role of Scrooge.

The trouble is this was dreadful (unintentionally.) I did not laugh once. It is clear that the joke has worn thin after last year's production.

All very good but Peter Pan Goes Wrong is marginally better I really don't know why I was on the flour I laughed so much this really will brighten your day

I have watch Peter Pan Goes Wrong(Movie), The Goes Wrong Show, and have The Play That Goes Wrong(Broadway) 3 times and loved all of them. This one does not disappoint either.

While the jokes and "fails" may be repetitive as they are the same as in the others, this is not a problem at all. These are fails that a lot of us in theatre worry about or what may happen during rehearsals or even the shows. What makes these different is the story of the show that is being put on. Same fails, but different settings.

As someone who has worked backstage in theatre for 11 years, mostly in set construction and lighting design, many of the fails are things we joke and worry about such as set safety. I know actors worry a lot about missing lines, messing up, etc. I have even had actors faint during shows and costumes completely fall apart. Besides the comedy part, it is very inspirational and encouraging about pushing through in a show no matter what happens.

Sadly though, these jokes are sometimes not as funny to those who have not done tech or acting before.

After the wonderful Peter Pan Goes Wrong, I was excited to see their take on a Christmas Carol. It isn't terrible, but it's not especially good either.

The premise appears to be that after being banned from the BBC, an acting troupe takes over a BBC production of A Christmas Carol.

I say this appears to be the premise because I only know that from reading it elsewhere. While watching I just saw them burst in and take over and I didn't see or hear any actual explanation of what was happening.

The humor retains much of the silliness of Peter Pan Goes Wrong and honestly, some very similar gags. But it is considerably less inspired. The only laugh out loud bits involve an actor who cannot read his lines and so has them written all over the set (including individual words on a bunch of grapes). It's very funny and clever, but 90% of the funniness and cleverness seems to have been expended on that 10-15 minutes worth of material.

While there are some good gags, nothing builds on anything else, so you get a moment of amusement and then it dies off, instead of each gag building on the next. I mean, there are a few callbacks, some pretty good, but overall the show just ... fails to launch.

Watchable but easy to ignore.

As much as I liked their take on Peter Pan I think is where they seemed to run out of ideas.

I want to like it: the pieces all seem to be there but it lacks that X factor Peter Pan had. Some of it is funny and some of it just feels rehashed and contrived.

They go way too far with a lot of gags and put too much emphasis on the actors personal lives.

I'm not saying avoid it but go in knowing that the best of this franchise is behind it.