Reviews Round-up of The Comedy About Spies in the West End [Updated]

"A head-spinning winner, spy spoof hits comedy gold"

"Mischief Theatre, the team behind The Play That Goes Wrong, did it again last night with yet another hit for theatreland. They strike comedy gold in their latest caper: a Sixties spy spoof that is like Johnny English meets Basil Fawlty in a Piccadilly hotel. It’s bigger, better and more brilliantly bungling than ever."

"... director Matt DiCarlo’s at one point literally ‘floorless’ production is slick as an oil spill on an ice rink."

"... it’s the two Henrys who steal the show. Shields, as the baker whose proudest moment was standing up to the KGB (Kent Guild of Breadmakers). And Lewis, as the constantly defeated yet invincibly resolute actor who identifies Bond in his audition as ‘ooh-seven’."

"Running at 120 minutes, I started counting to see if it really was a laugh a minute. Actually, it’s more like three – making it a 360, all-round, head-spinning winner."

"Rapid fire gags in a delightfully silly show"

"The sheer rate of jokes, from groanworthy to dynamite, may leave you crying helpless tears of laughter in this farce from the Mischief company"

"... the new show from Mischief, the company behind the smash-hit … Goes Wrong series, also offers farce, slapstick and multiple callbacks. So much of the script relies on linguistic misunderstandings (sweet/suite, need/knead, etc) that even the most tolerant viewer may become homophone-phobic."

"A predisposition to the gag-rate of Airplane! will boost enjoyment, though The Comedy About Spies is fast-paced enough to make that film seem positively Beckettian. I was crying helpless tears of laughter within the first five minutes, and at several other moments throughout, not least during a line about a haunted leaflet that would take a paragraph to explain."

"The depth of emotion in that similarly silly show [Operation Mincemeat] is also absent here, making The Comedy About Spies a more mechanical endeavour. Except, that is, for actor and co-writer Henry Lewis’s poignant final line reading, which bestows dignity on to a character (the Bond wannabe) who has been a buffoon throughout. This time, there were tears in my eyes for a different reason."

"This farcical ’60s spy caper is smack bang in the middle of Mischief Theatre’s comfort zone – and is all the more entertaining for it"

"... Mischief Theatre – they of The Play That Goes Wrong – are now aiming their slick brand of ever-escalating theatrical farce at the spy genre in this West End premiere."

"Writers and original Mischief Theatre members Henry Shields and Henry Lewis mine plenty of daft comedy... It’s low-hanging fruit, of course, but ramped up by Mischief Theatre’s trademark ability to spin seemingly minor mishaps into total comedy meltdowns."

"Director Matt Dicarlo handles these set-pieces and Shields and Lewis’s penchant for fast-moving wordplay deftly, allowing us half a knowing wink before whisking us on to the characters’ next blunder."

"Certain jokes sprawl over multiple scenes, bringing diminishing returns. However, for bungling wit matched with peerless physical comedy, you’d be hard pressed to find better in the West End."

"Bungling, buffoonish hilarity"

"Finally, Mischief may have found a match for their smash hit The Play That Goes Wrong"

"The Comedy About Spies is a 60s-set espionage farce full of misadventures and misunderstandings and packed with pratfalls and gags, some laboured but many hilarious. The plot is about as convincing as a Walther PPK made of blancmange, but that’s not really the point."

"Alongside the impeccable slapstick (for which the stage management team deserve as much praise as the cast) there are relentless running gags"

"... it made me laugh out loud more often than just about anything else I’ve seen in the last 12 months and the characters are charming and winningly delineated. The fans will love it: I and other sceptics may be converted."

"This level of stupidity takes real talent"

"Situated somewhere between Operation Mincemeat and Fawlty Towers, the tirelessly farcical evening delights in daftness"

"Mischief Theatre have taken shrewd stock of the state of the nation and decided we need cheering up."

"The troupe – probably the most successful UK comedy outfit since the Pythons – struck gold with their send-up of bumbling am-dram The Play That Goes Wrong"

"it’s worth observing that if you don’t have a penchant for running gags flogged to death, rampant mugging, cheap sight gags and corny word-play then you may not be the ideal audience here. That said, even the most averse spectator will likely marvel at the gag-a-line detail, comic timing and sheer physical bravura of this company of fools, led by Henry Lewis and Henry Shields"

"In a knowingly wearying second half, the plot thickens with spiralling double-crossing guaranteed to have everyone, not just the tourists, struggling to keep up. I’d say it takes near genius to fashion something this incorrigibly goofy."

"Just the type of inventive humour we need"

"The latest work by the team behind The Play That Goes Wrong is funnier, faster and even more absurd, set in the Sixties with a potpourri of Cold War plots"

"For years, I wondered why that whodunnit spoof The Play That Goes Wrong had managed to pull in audiences around the world. Had I suffered a sense of humour failure? What a pleasure, then, to discover that the Mischief team’s latest masterclass in mayhem is funnier, faster and even more absurd."

"Matt DiCarlo’s intricately calibrated production is a miracle of comic timing and ensemble acting."

"Lewis... steals scene after scene as Douglas Woodbead"

"It’s a McGuffin of a plot that leads to endless cases of mistaken identity, explosions, lethal umbrellas, smashed bottles of wine and an encounter with a bolshie pigeon in a wardrobe."

"Yes, the cascade of gags and puns does begin to flag slightly in the final quarter. Sometimes, you feel as if you’re collateral damage in a heavy-duty pillow fight. But this is just the kind of outrageously inventive humour that the world needs at the moment. Abandon yourself to the madness."

"The Comedy About Spies is the latest West End hot ticket"

"The new show from the team behind The Play That Goes Wrong is destined to be a hit"

"The myriad tropes and clichés of spy stories are super-ripe for Mischief-making, and writers Henry Lewis and Henry Shields tuck into them with enthusiasm."

"Chaos, of course, ensues. Sections of the humour tend to the broad and over-laboured, but this deceptively low-fi set-up requires high-tech levels of energy and skill, as well as precision-drilled choreography of the physical comedy and fight sequences."

"It is impossible not to be swept along by the giddily escalating mirth of Matt DiCarlo’s amiable production"

"This is the real secret to Mischief’s magic-making: their shows appeal across the generations in a way that vanishingly few do in our ever more fragmented entertainment landscape. It’s no small triumph and I confidently predict that the West End will be full of Mischief for years to come."

"Mischief’s Cold War caper has japes aplenty"

"Slapstick silliness is alive and well at the West End’s Noël Coward Theatre"

"The laughs come thick and fast but the show could easily lose a couple of minutes from each act without seriously impairing the overall merriment. Still, it’s crowd-pleasing stuff, if seldom as inspired as the best of the “….Goes Wrong” franchise that first put Mischief on the map."

"A hybrid of farce and variety show (the first two scenes are expertly choreographed sketches but mere curtain raisers to the play proper), this hums along at a terrific pace but never draws breath to allow us to get to know or care about the characters involved."

"The material is weaker than the structure and mechanics. Lewis and Shields clearly understand what makes great farce work, but could afford not to sling every funny idea at the wall to see what sticks"

"The Comedy About Spies looks splendid: Matt Dicarlo’s slick, occasionally ingenious production is very, perhaps excessively, scenery-heavy"

"Fans won’t be disappointed"

"Mischief Theatre’s latest is well executed but insubstantial"

"Identities are cloaked with shifty cover stories, innocents are questioned at gunpoint, and briefcases are exchanged with catastrophic consequences in this high-energy send-up of espionage from Mischief Theatre. In Matt DiCarlo’s production, beneath the trilby hats and trench coats, this tightly choreographed farce is brought to life by an eight-strong cast"

"As a spectacle it excels and it’s a good fit for its West End home. But while the physical comedy is impeccably executed, the bare-bones story it’s running on will leave some craving a little more substance."

"James Bond meets Abbott and Costello in The Comedy about Spies"

"The jokes come from all angles in this wondrously silly production that crams five shows’ worth of slapstick and farce into one"

"Its opening scene, a hyper-verbal spoof of codenames for spies, is James Bond meets Abbott and Costello times five. Wondrously silly stuff and it really made me laugh. After that, though, I smiled a lot, chortled a bit."

"... jokes come at you from all angles at all times. It can feel as if five shows’ worth of slapstick and farce has been crammed into one, which is a mixed blessing. Because what this carefully calibrated comedy machine comes short on is the human factor."

"I had fun. But, even with the safety of the world at stake, it never feels that it really matters if the spying goes wrong."