Sure, just add the aqueous base slowly to the lactone, stop occassionally to stir. No heat is necessary for this reaction, but it will heat up on its own and as it does the pace of the reaction will accelerate, so go slow.
The only things NOT to do are to either add all the aqueous base to the lactone wholesale or to add the NaOH pellets to the butyrolactone then add water.
This reaction is about as difficult as adding baking soda to vinegar and not having the thing foam up and make a mess (in other words, quite easy, just go slow).