At the end of May 2026, the twelfth West End cast of The Play That Goes Wrong took their final bows at the Duchess Theatre, amidst the wreckage of their set, and stepped aside to make way for the thirteenth.
(In case there's any confusion over cast numbers, I'm using 'twelfth' on this page to refer to the 2025/2026 cast and 'thirteenth' to refer to the 2026/2027 cast! I'm struggling to find any sources calling the departing cast the twelfth cast, but the official Mischief website definitely calls the new one the thirteenth, so I have cunningly deduced that the cast before it is probably the twelfth.)
There's something both beautiful and a little sad about the fact that you can't have the same experience at the theatre twice. Even though I saw The Play That Goes Wrong twice with the twelfth cast, just nine weeks apart, they were different performances. Details differed throughout the play, both small and large.
For example: the first time I saw The Play That Goes Wrong, a member of the audience called out to tell Chris where the missing ledger was. In response, Chris lambasted the audience furiously for several minutes. In addition to scolding the audience member who'd shouted, he told us off as a whole for laughing at a serious play.
On my second visit, nobody called out, so Chris and the audience never had that interaction! During The Murder at Haversham Manor, Chris carries a huge amount of pent-up fury with the audience for their inappropriate laughter, but someone who only saw that second performance might have no idea how angry he is with everyone watching.
Another substantial difference was the fact that, at the second performance, Robert and Dennis were played by understudies. It really got me thinking about how dramatically different a character can feel depending on the actor in the role. There are various situations in which you might see the same character played by different actors - between videogames and the thousands of Spider-Man films out there, I've seen no fewer than five different people in the role of Peter Parker - but it's common and expected in theatre in a way it isn't anywhere else.
And that's really cool! You get to experience different interpretations of the characters you love; you get to see them from new angles and discover new aspects of them! One of the Roberts I saw spat out the white spirit he'd been forced to drink; the other Robert steeled himself and choked it down like a maniac. They're both Robert Grove, but they come from slightly different worlds.
But, at the same time, there's something a little heartbreaking about a cast changeover, particularly when there's no filmed version of the play with the previous cast. I experienced a version of The Play That Goes Wrong that no longer exists.
I'm sure the new cast will do a great job! But it's Jack Hardwick's Chris who yelled at me and my friends and the rest of our audience; it's Ronnie Yorke's Trevor who spoke briefly to me and to my housemate Rei about the missing dog; it's Izzy Edmunds-Clarke's Annie who strode anxiously past me before the play began in order to talk to Chris; it's Robert Jackson's Robert who bellowed 'I IMPROVIIIIIISED!' so loudly that it's still ringing in my head months later.
I came into Goes Wrong fandom with The Goes Wrong Show, so I didn't first meet these characters in their twelfth-cast incarnations. But the twelfth Play That Goes Wrong cast will always be my introduction to the experience of The Play That Goes Wrong specifically, and, for that reason, I'll always have a fondness for them. Thank you for being so much fun to watch! I hope you were having fun on stage as well.
And good luck to the thirteenth cast! I'm sure everything will go smoothly this time around.