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Tonight, my wife and I saw Grave Mistakes in Oceano, California, at The Great American Melodrama (tickets still available for three more weeks). As she said afterward, “I can’t think of anyone I wouldn’t recommend it to.”
The show is written by Ben Abbott (best known in MoLit circles for Question of the Heart; I can’t link you to my review since Sunstone still hasn’t published it [starting to think they never will] so here’s a review at Exponent II and my interview with Ben about that show). This is Ben’s first full play to be performed and the Melodrama is a good home for it—not just because it’s funny, fast-paced, family-friendly, and accessible, but also because the Melodrama is where he first acted professionally back in 2006. Full circle!
(Incidentally, we were sitting in front of season ticket holders and one pointed out to the other that this play was “written by that Abbott guy” and while of course they love all the actors who pass through the melodrama, his performance in Frankenstein was such that, well, you just can’t help but have favorites, now can you?)
Anyway, here’s the set-up. An editor is renting a house on the cheap as locals agree it is haunted. He has allowed one of his writers to turn the attic into a workspace and they have been falling in love although neither will admit it. Meanwhile, the owner of the house has just discovered an Airbnb for ghosthounds which will allow him to turn this low-rent abode into a cashcow. So he brings in a paranormal expert to get the place certified at which point he will kick the editor out and start rolling in dough.
The problem is the house is haunted and the ghosts like the editor better than they expect they’ll like a B&B.
I could say more about the characters, the actors who play them, the jokes, and the direction (by Eric Hoit)—and if I had a chance to watch it a second time I certainly would—and I would love to write some about the themes of love and life and death and hope and desire—but I’m not going to do that either.
Suffice it to say that Grave Mistakes is a perfectly charming, expertly structured crowdpleaser willing to move beyond the laughs to a emotionally honest and moving denouement. If you’re near the Central Coast, make the drive.
And for those who do want an actual review, I agree with the local paper.
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Let me add that I’m not skipping on criticism because I am incapable of it. For instance, I could mention what I’ll sum up as The Case of the Disappearing Crystals and speculate on what they were up to in previous drafts (they and their larger purpose), or I could talk about what I see as the four major plots and how well they converged at the conclusion, but it feels weird to get into that kind of stuff with an audience that likely has no way to engage directly with the work being discussed.