Parker and Snell Company is bringing a popular murder mystery play to life at the Gaiety Theatre.
Dial M For Murder will be staged over three nights from Thursday to Saturday next week (November 24 to 26) as well as a matinee on the Saturday.
It follows on from the company’s highly successful previous excursion into the genre with Agatha Christie’s The Mousetrap, which was staged at the Gaiety in 2017.
Director Colin Snell, the company’s artistic director, said: ‘It’s an incredibly well-written play, full of intrigue and surprises and for lovers of murder-mystery plays – and for those who aren’t – will still keep people guessing as to how it is all resolved.
‘It’s wonderfully dark and atmospheric.’
The play tells the story of Tony Wendice, who has married his wife for her money and now plans to murder her for the same reason.
He arranges what he considers to be the perfect murder and secures the service of Lesgate, whom he is blackmailing, into strangling her for a fee of £1,000, and arranges a brilliant alibi for himself.
And although the plan does not work out as the prospective murderer ends up being murdered by his intended victim, Wendice seizes the opportunity to have his wife convicted of the murder.
Fortunately, an inspector from Scotland Yard and a young man who had been having an affair with Sheila discover the truth.
The cast features John Walker as Tony, Charlie Williams as Max, Kat Cawte as Sheila, Dave Shaw as Captain Lesgate and William Newton as Inspector Hubbard.
The show’s producer is Carl Parker.
Frederick Knott’s mid-century thriller was first staged in London in 1952 before its New York run in the same year.
Two years later it was made into a film with Ray Milland and Grace Kelly as Tony and Sheila Wendice by the legendary film-maker of the genre, Alfred Hitchcock.
The New York Times described Knott’s play as ‘original and remarkably good theatre – quiet in style but tingling with excitement underneath’ and ‘the events are given enough slight twists and sudden hitches to keep the chills and thrills running’.
Meanwhile, when the film was released, The Guardian described it as ‘a taut, acidly funny thriller’.
Evening performances on Thursday to Saturday next week start at 7.30pm and the Saturday matinee starts at 2.30pm.
Dial M For Murder is suitable for people aged 12 and over. Tickets cost £18 for adults and £17 for seniors.
They are available online at villagaiety.com, call the box office on 600555 or from the Welcome Centre at the Sea Terminal.
Following on from Dial M For Murder, Parker and Snell will be focusing on its Easter 2023 production. The company will bring E. Nesbit’s The Railway Children to the Gaiety stage.
The children’s classic has been adapted for the stage by Mike Kenny and the show will be directed by Colin.
It tells the story of a prosperous Edwardian family – mother and three children -– forced into near-penury in the rural north of England and captures the anxieties an exhilarations of childhood with great tenderness and insight. Tickets for The Railway Children go on sale from Thursday next week (November 24).