By Dennis Wemm
THEATRE CRITIC
Editor’s Note: Dennis is back following a brief hiatus due to some pressing family needs. The Advance welcomes him back!
Dial M for Murder
by Frederick Knott, revised by Jeffrey Hatcher
“Any reviewer revealing the plot twists of Deathtrap should be shot.”-Dick Shippey, 1981”
Produced by UMW Theatre
Directed by Marc Williams
The play runs through September 28. Purchase Tickets
A chestnut in theatre is an older play that is revived because it is a familiar, comfortable, formulaic piece that is sure to please an audience. It’s the theatre equivalent of a dad joke for the most part. It’s not a necessarily a challenge to current audience sensibilities. Chestnuts frequently appear at holiday seasons (A Christmas Carol) and over the summer (Grease). They also show up when audiences are uncertain and household entertainment dollars are stretched thin.
This doesn’t mean they are necessarily good or bad. They carry a label that creates trust. That trust makes it challenging to produce them without coming up with a modern spin or twist to keep them interesting. Critiquing such plays turns into a challenge for the reviewer, since when I was born 70 years ago, the play was already three years old. I’ve been literally watching Dial M and other mysteries like it since I started watching TV.
I have to answer “Will you enjoy seeing this play?” My response is “you almost certainly will like this production.” It is fast paced, fun, technically adept and inventive, acted well for the most part. It is not afraid to invoke suspense, or to allow long pauses to show important decisions being made. It’s also not afraid to have big payoffs.
So What Was Attempted?
To make us care enough for the characters in a domestic drama to want them to resolve their problems. To make us invest enough in their lies and deceits to be interested in what they do to each other. At the opening, Margot and Maxine have been having a romantic affair. Margot (Emmy Beach) is a conventionally married English daughter of wealth, Maxine (Rob Willcox) is a mystery writer who is used to writing novels by the rules. Maxine has a short list of motives and means, and writes her novels by describing opportunities.
Their affair is clandestine, secret, and intense. We have questions now as to if it’s still going on (the chemistry is still there) and since this is billed as a mystery whether they will be caught. They are also dressed to the nines and ready to head out for a play as a threesome with Margot’s husband, Tony (Benjamin Kline). The original version had Max as Margot’s heterosexual lover. The substitution is in no way gratuitous: with the social acceptance of divorce and the everyday acceptance of heterosexual infidelity that has grown up since the 1950s, a homosexual affair carries with it a similar shock value. It’s a canny strategy that pays off.
Max is a writer, and so is Tony in this version; everyone in the triangle know each other. He’s involved in Max having an interview on BBC radio program (interviewer voice by Joshua Gallagher) the next day. As Tony begs off seeing the show at the last minute, the women leave and Tony gets to work preparing the scene of the crime.
Tony has his own secrets: he sent has Margot blackmail notes to extort five thousand (1950’s) pounds. He’s discovered Margot and Max’s affair, and being a controlling cad he sees an opportunity for both revenge and personal profit. He can’t get both if he’s caught, so he needs help. Lesgate (Jonah Hillbert) enters, and the plot is on. Lesgate is a con man whose life is a secret mess of alibis and aliases. He’s got scruples about the whole idea of murder, but a prize of five thousand pounds is enough to make him forget them. Tony is that good a plotter and Lesgate’s don’t seem to be that strong. Pay attention to the details of the murder plot, each becomes important in the investigation. I’ll stop here, because by the end of the first act everyone’s preconceived notions are going to be proven wrong.
It becomes a game of ideas and circumstances, and we still haven’t met our detective, Chief Inspector Hubbard (Erika Storm). She is all business, but always seems to stop short of asking the necessary questions.
How Well Was It Done?
Very well indeed. The actors are very good at inhabiting their characters. They are fully committed vocally, from accurate British dialects down to a Hepburn-like Mid-Atlantic accent from Willcox. Physical commitment is strong as well. Margot’s insecurity and in the end overwhelming anxiety are plain on the surface, leading up to a worm-turning moment in Act II. The relationship between Margot and Maxine is portrayed mainly by tension and an intimate gaze, even though they seldom touch. Tony’s narcissistic need for control over Margot is masked by good humor at the beginning but is revealed in full in the cold-blooded planning of the murder in the interview with Lesgate.
Lesgate has the least stage time of the performers but still makes an impression with his moral ambiguity rising to each opportunistic motive. He’s sure to follow the money, scruples or no. Physically, he towers over Margot and should be able to dominate her. She has downed somewhere around 16 ounces of brandy by that point as well and is searching for more.
Hubbard is all business, and refrains from showing her hand (or to talk about police business). She is brisk, a kind of anti-Columbo. Her uniform is spotless and its design is spot-on. Her reactions frequently display her disbelief in the deadly antics of the other characters. At the same time, in mystery plays the bumbling cop is very much a trope that plays into the trope of the all-wise private detective. Don’t worry, justice in the play is served.
Costumes and hair in the play are spot on for the rest of the characters as well. The costumes not only tell the time period age, class, nationality, and income level of the characters, they also clue us in to their inner life. There are some very attractive choices there.
The scene is Tony and Margot’s living room of their ground floor flat in London’s fashionable Maida Vale. The height of the walls dwarfs the performers, the walls are neutrally painted. Modern (1950s) art decorates the walls. There are enough doors to stage a farce. The room is dominated by a desk fronting a set of French doors. The execution of the set design is meticulous, as are the props in use. Tony and Margot are clearly at ease in their home space, which seems to amuse Maxine and to impress Lesgate.
The play is accompanied with a soundscape that would support a theatrical release movie, the music insinuates itself in a cool way supporting the emotional content of the scene. A cleverly produced BBC interview is played in one scene that acts as a backdrop and a synchronizing clock for the action.
Lighting is realistic and seeming controlled by the characters turning on switches (does anyone remember when each wall switch had two buttons?). The color and tone of the lights reflect the time of day, the outside weather, the mood and in one memorable case a night scene that evokes a color version of a classic black and white crime drama. Timing of all electronic support is spot on. The “production number,” a death scene whose tech would do justice to any opera, is beautifully staged and focused.
It was live theatre and the second performance so some issues seem to inevitably happen; minor wardrobe malfunctions and props issues that provoked audience reaction but that the performers took in their stride and soldiered on. Some dialogue in longer speeches sped along faster than my comprehension did in the earlier scenes, but as the show progressed it righted itself.
Was It Worth Doing?
All in all, it was a great revival of a chestnut. The shock value of the original was restored, the script was streamlined and revised while leaving all the plot mechanisms intact. It was fun and the audience reaction was uproarious.
You should go see it and get your tickets early, it looks like a near sellout.
Warnings: much alcohol is consumed in this production. Since it portrays life in the 50’s, if no one smoked it would be out of place and the characters (both good guys and bad guys) do. There is one very brief explosion of violence, most of the work of the play is done by language and suspenseful silence.
Dennis Wemm is a retired professor of theatre and communication, having taught and led both departments at Glenville State College for 34 years. In his off time he was president and sometimes Executive Director of the West Virginia Theatre Conference, secretary and president of the Southeastern Theatre Conference, and generally enjoyed a life in theatre.
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Thank you for your detailed review!
We are Season Pass holders to the UMW Theater and also enjoy taking the Road Trips to Washington with them. What a wonderful asset to the community.
Please keep writing your helpful, well written reviews.