Normally, a community theater would try to avoid any unexpected disasters and general chaos when putting on a show. But this isn’t a normal theater.

“Play On!” is a show within a show, telling the story of a group of community theater actors putting on a play. Everything that could go wrong does in this Moscow Community Theater production at the Kenworthy Performing Arts Center this weekend and next.

“It’s very much a comedy (about) all the things that can go wrong while putting on a show,” Director Mike Long said. “I love it because I’ve see a lot of these things actually happen.”

These chaotic moments include running into furniture, offset light and sound effect cues and hysterical breakdowns. The local playwright in the show also keeps changing the murder mystery play the characters perform, “Murder Most Fowl,” Long said.

Set in 1993, the cast of characters includes an older married couple, a single successful businessman and a group of college kids, most of them with secondary roles.

These dual roles include Saul Waston/Dr. Rex Forbes, played by Moscow local McKay Babb, and Smitty/British butler Darius, played by WSU senior zoology major Zachary Bailey.

“The best way to describe Saul is a jackass,” Babb said. “He’s the one cracking the jokes … and causes tension.”

Babb said working two roles was easy because of the difference in personality between Saul and Forbes. Where Forbes is a villainious character who wants to get rich and kill people, Saul is just a villain because he’s mean, Babb said.

The characters Smitty and Darius have significant differences as well. Smitty is a timid, studious young man living with his mother while Darius is a rigid, “Downton Abbey” inspired butler, Bailey said.

Distinguishing between the two characters involves posture, the way they speak, and getting into the mindset of the characters, Baily said.

The show includes a backstage for the actors and a backstage onstage, where the audience can see things like a prop table, which they wouldn’t see in a normal show.

“I’m the director for the show but there is an actor playing the director,” Long said.

Taking away the fact that the show is a play within a play, the cast is required to purposefully mess up throughout the show, even during the third act when they put on the “Murder Most Fowl” play.

“I love it because, from a tech person standpoint, it gives me an opportunity to show an audience what happens behind the scenes,” Stage Manager Kristin Lincoln said.

Lincoln likes to describe the show as being about bad community theater. The actors have specific lines they screw up at certain times, but if they mess up the mess up they are able to roll with it and continue on.

“That’s our mantra: ‘It’s bad community theater,’” Lincoln said. “It’s not supposed to look perfect.”

The exaggeration of all these elements happening makes for a funny show, as the chaos builds from the first act of rehearsals to the performance of “Murder Most Fowl” when it becomes a theater person’s nightmare, Lincoln said.

“For me, it was getting to show what my world is like,” she said.

The theatre group will hold a 50/50 raffle during the show to raise money for the Moscow Community Theatre.

“Play On!” performs at the Kenworthy Performing Arts Center in Moscow on April 17, 18, 23, 24, and 25 at 7:30 p.m. and April 19 at 2 p.m.

The show will also play three times in Pullman on May 1 and 2 and 7:30 p.m. and May 3 at 2 p.m. at the Gladish Cultural and Community Center.

Tickets are $12 for adults and $10 for seniors and students.