Writer: Peter Rae
Director: Helen Bang
The latest in a successful run of sleuthing comedies from Canonbie Productions, this exuberant, fast-paced farce induces belly laughs from the outset and throughout.
Creative offspring of writer Peter Rae, director Helen Bang and their tight-knit ensemble, This is Not a Murder Mystery cleverly subverts and inverts the genre. Death isn’t promised in the first instance, enabling a wide vista of possibilities in plotting and characterisation.
Dispensing with the classic formula of upper-class male detective with lively female sidekick leaves the way clear for the strong, sophisticated trio of women in the piece, self-described as “early vintage”.
The play’s first half is largely taken up with amusing discourse around their lives, careers and general state of the world. This occurs in their shared theatre dressing room bedecked with flowers on the opening night of a murder mystery play. The three scarlet-clad, curve-flaunting characters enter the flow state of hair and makeup (as per the Drag Race Werk Room) that elicits mischievous, heartfelt and occasionally sweary dialogue.
It becomes clear that this show will have massive appeal for those who know and love the theatre and theatricality: it’s about the nerve-wracking and joyous process of devising and staging a play. All the tropes and tics are gleefully laid on: the camaraderie, rituals, superstitions, teasing and trolling.
The women carry out their shrieking, keening haka of a ‘Goddess ceremony’ and lambast the younger males that dare to enter their “sacred female space”: In particular, the impertinent Scottish Assistant Director and gopher James Maguffin (James MacKay), who embarks on an inadvertent M*cbeth-mentioning spree. And especially the surprisingly youthful Director Sebastian Fawn (Jonny Davidson), fresh from his first flirt with glory: an award for his tampon ads. Like a flustered, fumbling teen with his glossy curls, baseball cap and trainers, he’s (wilfully?) left himself vulnerable to torment by being woke (“What’re you: post hashtag / Me Too?”; “You young people: you think you invented being nice?!”) and summoning up a cast of such formidable harpies.
They’re charming and loveable harpies, though; harpies you really want to spend time with. Their manic energy and comedic timing bear comparison with the finest ‘Carry On’ stars. Elizabeth Treasure (Helen Bang) has the cheek of Liz Fraser and the commanding presence of Penelope Keith, Angelica Finchley-Power (Rosalind Blessed) manages to channel both the sultriness of Fenella Fielding and dry wit of Hattie Jacques, while Sheila Jayne Punnock (“The Common One” as Angelica calls her, played full force by Laura Morgan), impudent, bum wiggling and giggling, is Barbara Windsor all over.
They aren’t merely funny, though: there’s texture and poignancy too. The brave yet light-hearted way that Elizabeth discusses and demonstrates the loss of her eye to cancer (as actually happened to Helen Bang during the formation of the play) is genuinely moving, as are the insights around female life after 50.
The rapidly-developing onstage scenario doesn’t allow for over-introspection, however: it becomes clear that stage manager Cath is a controlling bitch, that Angelica and James are in a relationship of some sort, that a bird has entered the auditorium, that Cath has cruelly killed it and that… something terrible has happened to Cath.
The second half deals with this unexpected occurrence. Cue the protracted entrance of magnifying glass-wielding Detective Inspector Charles Fortitude (Peter Rae) to telly ’tec music, dressed like a poker player in waistcoat and fedora. Stealthily creeping around the backstage set, he is, sequentially, shape-shifting.
Commanding as he summons the suspects, charmed by huggy, note-taking, wannabe ’tec Elizabeth, cowed in the presence of Angelica, once the star of his favourite sci-fi show, and hilariously deranged when forcefully interviewing Sheila from behind, pacing backwards as he pushes against the backrest of her chair.
There is, of course, a clever twist at the end that succeeds in being both heavily signposted and sufficiently satisfying: spotting it a mile off doesn’t spoil the fun. One of only a few slight downsides to the piece is that the young, male characters seem a bit one-dimensional. But perhaps showcasing their shortcomings compared to their strong female co-players is part of the point.
Overall, This is Not a Murder Mystery is a distracting delight that has huge fun with wordplay, and theatrical, cinematic, actorly and telly tropes. There’s also enough substance in the celebration of mature, indomitable divas to lift this tangentially murdery ‘play before a play’ beyond mere rollicking romp.
If you’d like a night out that passes swiftly in bright flashes of laughter, warmth and repartee, in the company of a cast whose sense of fun is absolutely infectious, without having to think too deeply, this will serve you very well.
Runs until 7 June 2025
