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rionaleonhart) wrote2026-01-04 04:06 pm
rionaleonhart) wrote2026-01-04 04:06 pm
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The Show Must Go On.
I can't believe my fandom of the moment is The Goes Wrong Show. How on Earth do you write fanfiction for The Goes Wrong Show? It's a show that constantly employs visual comedy, a style of comedy famously unsuited to a non-visual medium, and the main characters are a troupe of actors who we only ever see actively putting on a play, meaning they're in-character most of the time and it's hard to discern the actors' voices.
There's something oddly endearing about how dedicated the Cornley Polytechnic Drama Society are, and how relentlessly they press on with the show as everything collapses around them. They always seem to believe that maybe the rest of the play will work out all right. Every line and every prop has been a disaster so far, but surely they can salvage this performance!
One thing I appreciate is that it's not just 'everyone fucks up and forgets their lines', as I originally thought it might be; the actors each have their own distinct set of traits and their own set of challenges. Dennis fucks up and forgets his lines, yes! Trevor, in the background as the stage manager, works very hard but also messes up constantly. But everyone else has different issues.
I'm going to try to pin those issues down, actually, as a characterisation exercise. Sandra plays up to the camera; Max plays up to the audience; Robert, convinced that he's God's gift to the theatre (he's my favourite), constantly feuds with the director and tries to bolster the importance of his roles; Jonathan is actually a solid actor but rarely makes it onto the stage on account of his inability to open doors. Vanessa and Chris would do fine in a less cursed theatre company but respond very badly to things going wrong; she panics and desperately follows the script even when it would be best to deviate, and he gets increasingly livid. Annie is surprisingly solid in this disaster of a theatre company - she's both able to act and able to think on her feet - but she can be a little overdedicated to the role, most notably in 'The Lodge', when she takes playing dead extremely seriously despite the fact that her character was not supposed to be killed.
I'm constantly impressed by these stupid disaster plays. The timing is absolutely extraordinary. I watched Peter Pan Goes Wrong on DVD last night, and I'm reeling from the fact that this show had an actual West End run, given that pretty much the entire set gets wrecked over the course of the play; did they have to destroy it every evening and rebuild it every day? Doing a play that goes wrong must be so much harder than doing a play that goes right!
I was hoping that writing this post might give me some inspiration, but, alas, I still have no idea how one would even start writing The Fic That Goes Wrong. I'm struggling to even think of a concept. They put on a play; it's going too smoothly; it starts to make the cast uncomfortable; they fuck it up on purpose and end up bowing triumphantly in front of the burning set while Chris screams in the background?
Whether I end up writing anything or not, though, I'm having a great time with this ridiculous show! Even if it's a great opportunity for my housemates to mock me, because I find Robert (as played by Henry Lewis) strangely attractive, and he keeps getting cast in such notably unsexy roles as Father Christmas, Adolf Hitler and the family dog.
A fun aspect of getting into The Goes Wrong Show: now, when I trip over or drop something or otherwise mess up, as I frequently do, I can think 'ah, just like my beloved disaster actors,' and somehow it makes everything less frustrating.
There's something oddly endearing about how dedicated the Cornley Polytechnic Drama Society are, and how relentlessly they press on with the show as everything collapses around them. They always seem to believe that maybe the rest of the play will work out all right. Every line and every prop has been a disaster so far, but surely they can salvage this performance!
One thing I appreciate is that it's not just 'everyone fucks up and forgets their lines', as I originally thought it might be; the actors each have their own distinct set of traits and their own set of challenges. Dennis fucks up and forgets his lines, yes! Trevor, in the background as the stage manager, works very hard but also messes up constantly. But everyone else has different issues.
I'm going to try to pin those issues down, actually, as a characterisation exercise. Sandra plays up to the camera; Max plays up to the audience; Robert, convinced that he's God's gift to the theatre (he's my favourite), constantly feuds with the director and tries to bolster the importance of his roles; Jonathan is actually a solid actor but rarely makes it onto the stage on account of his inability to open doors. Vanessa and Chris would do fine in a less cursed theatre company but respond very badly to things going wrong; she panics and desperately follows the script even when it would be best to deviate, and he gets increasingly livid. Annie is surprisingly solid in this disaster of a theatre company - she's both able to act and able to think on her feet - but she can be a little overdedicated to the role, most notably in 'The Lodge', when she takes playing dead extremely seriously despite the fact that her character was not supposed to be killed.
I'm constantly impressed by these stupid disaster plays. The timing is absolutely extraordinary. I watched Peter Pan Goes Wrong on DVD last night, and I'm reeling from the fact that this show had an actual West End run, given that pretty much the entire set gets wrecked over the course of the play; did they have to destroy it every evening and rebuild it every day? Doing a play that goes wrong must be so much harder than doing a play that goes right!
I was hoping that writing this post might give me some inspiration, but, alas, I still have no idea how one would even start writing The Fic That Goes Wrong. I'm struggling to even think of a concept. They put on a play; it's going too smoothly; it starts to make the cast uncomfortable; they fuck it up on purpose and end up bowing triumphantly in front of the burning set while Chris screams in the background?
Whether I end up writing anything or not, though, I'm having a great time with this ridiculous show! Even if it's a great opportunity for my housemates to mock me, because I find Robert (as played by Henry Lewis) strangely attractive, and he keeps getting cast in such notably unsexy roles as Father Christmas, Adolf Hitler and the family dog.
A fun aspect of getting into The Goes Wrong Show: now, when I trip over or drop something or otherwise mess up, as I frequently do, I can think 'ah, just like my beloved disaster actors,' and somehow it makes everything less frustrating.
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but that works better if there's like. A thing you want to happen that is not the play going right
This is the tricky thing; there's not much I want from these characters, other than watching them have a disastrous time on stage! There's technically room for shipping, but, alas, I don't actually ship any of the characters myself, although I can appreciate the enemies-to-lovers (or just enemies-and-lovers) potential of Robert/Chris. And there's technically room for character growth; Robert's pretty awful, and I could have him grow over the course of a fic. But I don't want to. He's perfect ♥
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Robert's pretty awful, and I could have him grow over the course of a fic. But I don't want to. He's perfect ♥
Lmaoooo, that's v on brand. You could make him worse? But possibly he is at ideal levels of Riona Bait Terrible Man & should not be made either better or worse.
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It's a show that constantly employs visual comedy, a style of comedy famously unsuited to a non-visual medium
Fate is setting you a writing challenge for the new year: description! Comedic description!
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I suspect that that's the case for a lot of things! It seems like it must take forever to clean the set up and put everything back together, though; there's a lot of destruction going on.
description! Comedic description!
noooooooo, I'm bad enough with description as it is; I can't do sight gags!
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The physical comedy reminds me very fondly of Faulty Towers
Absolutely! Chris also has very Basil Fawlty vibes when he's yelling at his actors. (I've just watched the Nativity episode, and I'm starting to think 'Chris snaps and goes on a killing spree' is a fic that needs to exist, but I'm not sure that's something I want to write!)
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Oh, that sounds fun!
A meta fic where you try to walk them through a classic fanfic scenario, but everything goes wrong, ending with the fic itself going fire?
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In the UK, it's on BBC iPlayer or DVD; outside the UK, I think I've heard it's officially available free on the LionsgateTV YouTube channel, but, being in the UK, I can't be sure! The most insane episode, if you want to jump in at the deep end, is '90 Degrees', a feat of performance I absolutely cannot get my head around.
If you give it a try, I hope you enjoy it!
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I very nearly cracked up laughing at this, because this comment reached me right when I was actively working on a scene in a Goes Wrong Show 'there was only one bed' fic. It's definitely fourth-wall-breaking, but not in quite the way you envision!
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