‘An entertaining improvised murder mystery. Not one miss!’
This hilarious whodunnit is an Agatha Christie-inspired masterpiece, that is completely improvised based off of the audience’s ideas, making it your very own classic murder mystery play.
As everyone took their seats, the detective of the show ‘Agatha Crusty’ sat down in the corner of the stage, isolated from the rest of the set, interacting with the audience and writing notes, accompanied by jazz music to give it the 1920’s feel. When the show began, she briefly introduced herself and the play, and then the lights came up on the audience. One lucky member of the audience was chosen to be ‘Jerkins’, her assistant. The plot of the show was then decided by audience members shouting out ideas for the location and murder evidence and then Jerkins picked out of their suggestions, ours taking place at a taxidermy convention, and a wet instruction manual for deep lunging found at the crime scene. What made the show hilarious was that any other suggestions that were shouted out which didn’t make the cut, the actors tried to somehow incorporate throughout.
We were then introduced to the cast, each of the five with their own signature colour – a bit like Cluedo! They improvised scenes based on the audience’s decisions, which was very cleverly helped by the detective in the corner of the stage as she prompted them with ideas or told them what would happen next to move the show on. They were also helped by the lighting team, who would bring the lights down to end the scene if the actors were struggling or it was going on too long. Detective Agatha Crusty then made her way to ’Jerkins’ in the audience who picked from 5 character cards who would be the victim of the murder, and then who would commit the crime.
One of the stand out things was the lack of props and set. It was brilliant watching the cast use their imagination, using rolling pins as rhinoceros horns, and miming the missing items, but it didn’t take away from the piece at all. The show was accompanied by Sara Garad, an improv pianist, who played during the show, following everything that was happening on stage and adding character and emotion to the piece.
The only thing to note was that there were a few lighting issues throughout the show; the lights coming up on the audience when they weren’t meant to. But honestly the audience were enjoying themselves so much that it wasn’t really noticeable and didn’t affect the performance.
The show was a true testament to how skilled these actors were. Being able to stay in character whilst thinking of everything on the spot, and then having the ability to remember every little thing that the other actors had said so that the story flowed. It was honestly incredible to watch. Of course there were a few laughs that were held in from the cast, but it’s expected from an improvised comedy. It’s definitely one to watch, even better if you watch it more than once. Not one show will be the same but every single time you will be laughing your head off and leaving the theatre impressed!
Murder, She Didn’t Write tours across the UK this summer, tickets are available here.