Iryna Poplavska as Cristina, Callum Balmforth as Russell and Jason Durr as Jonny having cruel fun with the clown would-be robber. Picture: Pamela Raith

Murder at Midnight

Birmingham Rep

*****

Have you heard the one about the nun, the vicar and the clown at the new Year's Eve party? It's a dead laugh, in fact there is lots of dead and even more laughs.

As for the dead bit, or lot rather than bit in this case, it is at the top end of the Midsomer Murders corpse count scale, which is not really giving anything away as we start with scenes of crime doing their Silent Witness bit and a member of his majesty's constabulary (Andy McLeod) relaying the catalogue of corpses to a fellow officer (Bella Farr).

It’s a list that takes up a fair bit of time what with a shooting, a stabbing, a drug overdose, a crossbow bolt and a case of being turned into pork pies (Sweeney Todd would have been proud) and that didn't even include Robbie Williams – that's the guard dog not the singer by the way.

Yes, Jonny The Cyclops knew how to throw a good party. Our one-eyed host is a successful and legitimate businessman (his description). He is a pig farmer and an expert in man management, his being a more permanent kind than the average personnel department employ, and he has a modest sideline in pharmaceuticals that are not generally available at Boots and come in kilos rather than blister packs.

Jason Durr plays him to perfection, a loveable (debateable) rogue, master of all he surveys, sort of, with wonderful comic timing and a constant hint of menace lurking somewhere behind the smile and the eye patch.

He is matched by his mother, Shirley, played beautifully by Susie Blake. Shirley is cantankerous, decides every one of his girlfriends is not good enough for him, and will do anything for her little boy . . . tough love takes on new meaning here. She hates pretty well everyone and everything, with smoking a particular bête noire.

Susie Blake as Jonny's cantankerous mum, Shirley

And Jonny's ex-wife adds a unseen spectre to proceedings, unseen because she is missing, presumed dead. She was Jonny's first wife and her disappearance or murder five years ago, have never been solved which brings in the vicar, Paul, played by Max Bowden, who is determined to find out the truth, for his own reasons and he pursues his mission with a level of incompetence second to none.

He is also falling in love with Lisa, played with gangster's moll sexuality to burn by Katie McGlynn. She is Jonny's current girlfriend and, as she would put it, on a scale of one to 10, how wise is it to be having an affair with the live in girlfriend of a legitimate businessman (who is really a drug lord, gangland boss and killer)? Answers on a condolence card.

Lisa is no Bimbo though, although she is perceived as a dumb blonde that view hides perhaps the most complex character in the play, she has ambitions and feelings, she is impulsive and emotional and ends up torn between her feelings for Jonny, or perhaps it is more from feelings of fear in his case, and her genuine affection for her new love Paul. Somehow there is an underlying sadness and vulnerability about her.

Meanwhile every legitimate businessman in the Jonny mould needs a right hand man, or muscle if we are being honest, so enter Trainwreck, a lumbering heavy in the capable, outsize hands of Peter Moreton.

Max Bowden as Paul and Katie McGlynn as Lisa

Trainwreck has a dilemma which worries him but worries Jonny more, something to do with evidence and immunity, which is where Jonny's man management skills come in with a new carefully planned assignment for Trainwreck, one without a return ticket, to make the dilemma go away.

Now as Shirley appears to have a touch of dementia she has a carer Cristina, from Bucharest, which is 600 miles from Warsaw . . . just saying. She is played by Iryna Poplavska, who played Ugly Betty in the 48 franchised TV episodes in her native Ukraine before coming to London and gaining an MA in acting for screen.

This is her debut UK theatre role, and she nails it beautifully as the outsider caught up in a family squabble, a witness to an adulterous affair and stumbling into a history of a murder she knows nothing about.

And even more an outsider is our would-be robber Mr Fish, Russell, played by Callum Balmforth. Remember the clown? That was Russell's scary disguise, except Jonny does not scare easily – unlike Russell when he finds out who Cristina's boss really is.

He eventually makes a run for it, except Jonny's seven dogs, led by Robbie, can run faster and don't seem to suffer from coulrophobia – that's fear of clowns in case you are interested.

So, one down. Poor old Robbie is No 2, with the return of crossbow toting Trainwreck, who, let's just say, turned down Jonny's redundancy scheme and finds Robbie less than friendly, leaving him less than alive.

Jason Durr as Jonny and Peter Moreton as Trainwreck

 Perhaps we should mention that Jonny is a huge Robbie Williams fan, hence the dog's name, and at the other end of the musical scale he hates Coldplay – indeed his entire feelings towards anyone, be it good intentions or revengeful evil, seem to depend entirely on which music you prefer.

So, we go through the music preferences as well as a discussion on whether it was Reggie or Ronnie Kray that was gay – it was Ronnie if you are interested.

Then there is Jonny's past affairs, and Alex's and even Trainwreck's, as well as Shirley and Jonny's dad. Then what about Lisa's affair with Jonny - was it before or after Alex vanished – and her affair with the vicar . . . it all gets a bit messy but bit by bit arguments are settled – see police report at the start.

It is all enormous laugh out loud fun, with a brilliant cast and some brilliant lines to savour and the sort of timing you just can't teach, exploiting the power of the pause, the quietly dropped in aside and full of entrances and exits requiring and receiving split second timing.

A shout out to whoever designed the shooting effect, it was humour at its blackest but wonderful special effects to give the audience a laugh with an uncomfortable jolt.

Torben Betts has given us a witty, clever script, with some lovely lines and characters, but it is a script with hidden depths with both Russell and Trainwreck, both characters drowning at the bottom of society, making impassioned speeches which go beyond mere laughs, pauses for thought in the midst of glorious comedy, a reminder that there is a real life out there, and for some it is a real struggle.

But at heart it is a wonderful comedy and before you ask Lisa, it gets a nine, it would have been a ten but for some sound problems which lost a little dialogue in this otherwise wonderful Original Theatre production.

Directed by Philip Franks the New Year will be ringing in to 20-09-25

Roger Clarke

16-09-25 

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