These are the notes I made immediately after seeing Christmas Carol Goes Wrong on 14 January 2026, originally posted to my blog on Dreamwidth!
I've just returned from seeing Christmas Carol Goes Wrong at the Apollo Theatre, because I have reached full-on 'buying theatre tickets' levels of unwell about the Goes Wrong Show and its associated productions.
I caught a candid glimpse of Dennis's actor Jonathan Sayer just after I entered the theatre, as I headed towards the loos, and it felt deeply surreal.
A note I made before heading out to see the play: There's always the chance I'll get an understudy, of course, but, if he's present, I'm not sure how I'll cope with being in the same room as Robert's actor Henry Lewis, who is so hot it makes me genuinely nervous.
He was, in fact, there! As tall and loud and handsome as I could desire; I had a good view of him from my place at the side of the stalls. Although I do have a bone to pick with whoever decided to trap Robert in an enormous present box for most of the second act (quite possibly Lewis himself), which was very funny but did unfortunately obscure his excellent face.
Come to think of it, the 'if he's present' in my initial note accidentally ended up being an incredible pun.
Dennis, Jonathan, Trevor and Robert (♥) were played by their actors from the Goes Wrong Show; Chris, Annie, Sandra and Max were not. Everyone did a great job, but I have to give special mention to Daniel Fraser, who was absolutely perfect in the role of Chris. It's not easy to play a character when your entire audience is used to seeing another actor in that role! But I thought Fraser was magnificent.
Annie is extremely enthusiastic and seems to adore everyone in the society. During auditions for the Christmas Carol production, she hugs everyone who comes in (Robert, Dennis, Jonathan, Max - I assume Sandra as well, although we start midway through hers) and says that every audition performance is brilliant. Important characterisation information! I'm particularly glad that she and Robert seem to get along; it can be hard to gauge how Robert and the other members of the society feel about each other.
I loved Robert striding into his audition and saying 'Thank you both so much for coming' to the people auditioning him.
Apparently Annie and Max recently completed a six-year acting course under Robert. Every indication that the drama society's members also spend time together in other contexts is very important to me.
At one point, while Chris was being aggressive to everyone, Annie backed away from him, putting her back against Robert's chest, and Robert put his hands protectively on her shoulders. Cute??
Jonathan is traumatised by his fall during Peter Pan and terrified of heights. He was nervous about returning to the stage but reminded himself of the Cornley Drama Society's motto: 'The show must go on, regardless of the human cost'.
According to Trevor, the lights periodically falling from the rigging onto the stage is all part of the process. 'The weak ones fall; it's natural selection.'
Robert proposed performing nude to save money on costuming so they could afford a post-show party. I thought at first that he really wanted a party, but it turns out he's also really into the idea of doing a nude play. Later, when he makes a bid to take over as director: 'Our next production will be Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. But nude!'
Robert objected strongly to the fact that his main role was the Ghost of Christmas Present, who didn't come on until the second act: 'The audience are usually long gone by then.'
Robert's only scripted line in the character of the clerk was 'Yes.' He delivered it in as drawn-out and dramatic a way as possible, and found several more ways to include it beyond the confines of the script.
I enjoyed watching Robert desperately try to cram himself into a giant box of Maltesers. I will not be giving further context at this time.
At one point Robert attempted to play Scrooge and instead played John McClane ('I'm Ebenezer Scrooge. There are terrorists in the building! Yippee-ki-yay, motherf—'), in an extremely confusing character collision for me; Robert, Scrooge and McClane are all characters I'm very fond of!
On account of a failure to plan choreography in advance, everyone ended up doing a slow Macarena to violin music in one scene. 'Do the Macarena' is very much my personal strategy when I'm forced to dance and don't know what to do; I'm glad to see that the Cornley Drama Society take the same approach!
At one point Max attempted, unsuccessfully, to goad Jonathan into a kiss.
When inappropriate pop music started blaring and everyone else desperately tried to stop it, Max cheerfully danced along.
One of Robert's various efforts to steal the role of Scrooge, it's important to note, involved tying Chris up and taping his mouth shut.
The curtain that fell at the interval was an enormous replica of Robert Grove's CV (page 1 of 148). He lists 'Dog Ownership' as one of his skills, and his roles include 'audience member' for Star Wars: Return of the Jedi, the role of Robert Grove in 'Anecdote', directed by Robert Grove (venue: restaurant), every character in The Wind in the Willows (venue: 'shouted in street'), and Dracula in Immersive Dracula (venue: 'audience member's house (forced entry)'). In a production of Romeo and Juliet, he played both Romeo and Juliet. I'll be honest: I would watch the hell out of that.
He's perfect. If I were directing a play, I would cast him in every role, and I think he'd agree that this would be the correct decision.
Robert was in a giant Christmas present for his role as the Ghost of Christmas Present, and he was unable to fully emerge from it; only his legs were visible. He invited Chris (as Scrooge) to take his hand, then, realising that wouldn't be possible, amended the instruction to 'touch my thigh'.
Chris: I'm not going to touch your thigh.
Sandra, narrating: Scrooge did as he was told.
Chris: (very unhappily puts his hand on Robert's thigh)
Trevor, attempting to puncture an air hole in Robert's Christmas present prison, apparently stabbed Robert 'right in the tit'.
New Robert lore: he has a son called Fleance, who spends most of his time with his stepdad. Unusually, Fleance was coming to the play this time, so Robert really wanted to play Scrooge, a role he was tragically denied. After the play:
Sandra: Did Fleance enjoy it?
Robert: He left in the interval, so... maybe.
I am, incidentally, delighted that Robert chose a Macbeth reference for his child's name. I mean, Fleance's mother (presumably Denise?) could theoretically have chosen the name, but, let's be honest, the kid's called Fleance; we all know Robert was responsible for that.
Another important Robert lore detail: his balls are canonically sodden with sweat while he's trapped in the giant Christmas present. Actually, maybe it's not that important. Maybe we should all forget I said that, in fact.
After the curtain fell on the in-play production of A Christmas Carol, Trevor came out to address the audience.
Trevor: We've decided that, rather than the cast coming out to take a bow—
Audience: Aw.
Trevor: Don't interrupt me. Rather than the cast coming out to take a bow—
Audience, louder: Awwww.
Trevor: Sod off. Sod absolutely off.
He tried a couple more times to restart the line, but the audience just kept 'awww'ing. Eventually he broke and started laughing, then managed to get the audience to stay quiet by going 'listen up, this is important!' and jumping straight into the second half of the line ('I'm going to read this legal statement').
(At the end of the actual play, Jonathan Sayer thanked everyone present for being such a 'wonderful and raucous audience'. Or was it 'boisterous'? It was, in any case, delivered in a good-humoured 'wow, you guys' tone.
To be clear, the audience generally behaved themselves! They did get a little overexcited when addressed directly, in a way that made me worry they might feel empowered to heckle later on, but my concern was unfounded; everyone showed solid judgement on when it was and wasn't appropriate to make remarks.)
An out-of-context line from Robert: 'When I last saw [Chris], he was crawling out of Tiny Tim's massive arsehole. Then he ran off towards the canal, shouting, "I'm better than this."'
When they got a neutral review and everyone celebrated, Chris threw himself into Robert's arms and Robert spun him around in a hug, and it was pretty cute.
Also cute: Chris putting an arm around Annie's shoulder just before the review came in, when he agreed with her that they shouldn't worry too much about what critics might say. 'What's important is that we put on a performance. Was it perfect? No. But did it happen? ...sort of, yes.' It certainly sort of did.