Agathat Christie made me do it!

‘Agatha Christie made me do it’ was written in 1975. This spoof play is one of the 30 light-hearted comedies, mysteries and melodramas written by Houston playwright Eddie Cope. He died about a year ago aged 96. This production is being presented by The Phoenix Theatre Inc. at the Phoenix Memorial Hall Theatre, corner of Carrington Street and Rockingham Road in Hamilton Hill. The evening shows start at 8.00 pm, running until Saturday 16^th April. There are Matinees on 10^th and 17^th which start at 2.00 pm.

        We join newly retired policeman PC Cyril Cheshire (Terry Winter), who after years of walking the beat, has decided that writing about crime is more satisfying than his actual job. He is clicking away on his typewriter whilst using an Agatha Christie's ‘How to write mysteries’ handbook as his reference. Then what he is writing comes to life on the stage.

        It is first thing on a Tuesday morning, in the central London apartment living room of extremely wealthy heir, Monte Brainard (Jonathan Young). Monte’s old-fashioned butler, a fine blend of Jeeves and Lurch, Waldo (Willy Smeets) lays out the breakfast. Annie, the chambermaid (Shellee Muir) brings in the morning newspaper and points out an article to Monte.

         The headlines reads ‘Playboy smashes up club bar’, Monte finds out that the article is about him and his night of wild romance. A night that ended in his marriage to Jenny (Gillian Humphreys), a bimbo who works in a chocolate factory. No sooner had he read the article, than his heartbroken fiancée, Cindy (Kate Kee) phones to tell him their engagement is off. His family solicitor, Sam Sears (Steve Osborne) arrives to try and clear up the mess. It is at this point that Monte finds that he has missed a day – when he went to bed it was Sunday night, now it is Tuesday morning – how?

         As though things aren’t bad enough, Monte’s dodgy business partner, Glen (Carl Lloyd) is being threatened. A tarty stripper, Jo Jo LaMotte (Keziah Williams) demands her conjugal rights. Jenny’s muscle bound, protective brother, Dutch (Michael Vertigan) comes looking for blood. Then there is Ruperta; Monte’s avaricious cousin who has seen off a few husbands and now has Monte’s money in sight. 

After years of hard work at The Castle Theatre in Rockingham, refugee Barry Page has now discovered the Phoenix Theatre where his talents as a director have been welcomed open-armed. Several of the cast members have travelled up from Rockingham to help him out, including assistant director Terry Winter.

Sadly, this is yet another play with cast members for genuine reasons, having to drop out coupled with a real tragedy. However, with ‘the show must go on’ attitude, they all did a superb job to the smallest audience that I have seen in years – yet tonight it is to be an almost full house! ‘The Lord giveth and taketh away’.

The lighting was by Steve Watson and the sound effects by Hywell Williams, with amazing costumes and wigs from Lorraine Page.

One of the best full colour programmes that I have seen.

This play is funny with some strange characters, but most importantly one of the best ‘whodunits’ that I have seen for a while. Filled with red herrings and twists. Most enjoyable.