Al McCaughey as Michael and Lauren Rote as Laura
The Unexpected Guest
Hall Green Little Theatre
****
So, you come across the still warm corpse
of man in a wheelchair with a somewhat telling suggestion of a cause of
death, viz. a neat bullet shaped hole in his head, and, facing him, his
wife, or widow as she now is, holding a rather incriminating gun and
admitting responsibility for the said hole . . . that should be case
closed . . . or should it?
The two hours of twisting and turning through a
shoal of red herrings and up and down blind alleys that follow, suggests
we should not have been so hasty, especially with a hint of infidelity
and a touch of blackmail added to the mix to provide a little spice and
a lot of confusion in this beautifully paced production.
After all this is Agatha Christie, queen of the
murder whodunit, displaying her masterly skill in creating suspense
allied to misdirection and confusing intrigue to keep you guessing.
And being Christie it is set in an isolated house
with an eccentric and now dead owner and we are suffering inclement
weather, in this case a thick blanket of November fog, and we have
enough suspects to give the local South Wales constabulary something to
fill their day.
Let’s just say that the case is not quite as open
and shut as we thought, the obvious no longer quite so certain.
The deceased is Richard Warwick, played with a
corpselike immobility by David Cranthorne, a former big game hunter left
crippled after one big game got even with him. It seems he has since
spent his time being nasty to all and sundry and sitting with a gun by
the French windows taking pot shots at anything that moved – rabbits,
birds, cats, people collecting for charity . . .
His long suffering wife is Laura in a lovely
performance from Lauren Rote who manages a whole range of emotions as
the killer, the victim, the widow, the abused and . . . let's just say
she had reason enough to put a bullet in his head . . . but the question
is, did she?
John Wittell as Henry Angell and Paul
Hanna as Insp Thomas
Then there is Richard’s mother, played by Judith
Taylor, still treading the boards with some style in her 80s. Mrs
Warwick has no illusions about her son, an unpleasant piece of work, but
would she kill him? Would she even be physically capable of the deed?
Definitely in the frame is Richard’s half brother
Jan, played with a lovely childish enthusiasm by Prav Phull. Jan has an
intellectual disability as it is now termed rather than Christie’s more
robust description.
Richard has amused himself by threatening to put
Jan in a home, delighting in frightening him, and the excitable Jan tells
us how he likes blood and now Richard is dead, he is head of the
household, and Richard’s large collection of guns, a veritable arsenal of
weapons, which Richard lets him shoot occasionally, now belong to
him . . . stable is not one of his attributes and his susceptibility to
suggestion not one of his strengths.
Caring for him is the Warwick’s housekeeper Miss
Bennett, played with a knowledgeable air by Jo Walker. Miss Bennett is a
stock Christie character introduced to provide us with the background
details, inner workings and relationships of the main characters, and at
the same time giving us another suspect.
Then there is Henry Angell, played at a
gloriously languid tempo by John Whittell. Angell is the gentleman’s
gentleman, Richard’s valet, and he is rigid, formal, with every word
carefully measured and delivered. You suspect he sees himself as
superior to those he serves. Richard was, in his words, difficult and
Angell has his own secrets, as well as knowing those of others. He seems
to be disliked by everyone and has enough of his own reasons to join the
suspect list.
Prav Phull as Jan with Jo Walker as Miss
Bennett and Stephen Awre as Sgt Cadwallader behind
Edging into the frame is Julian Farrar, played by
Richard Scott, who lives in the neighbouring property. He is a friend of
the Warwicks and is the Liberal party candidate in next week’s
by-election, and when his particular secret is revealed it boosts his
suspect rating no end. That, and the fact he is dodgy – not because he
is a politician we hasten to add, or not just because of that, but
because he is shifty and has that politician honed skill of never quite
answering the question asked.
The questions coming from Paul Hanna as
analytical and methodical Inspector Thomas with his by the book methods
and his Keats loving uniformed assistant, Sgt Cadwallader, played by
Stephen Awre, adding a blunt Welsh . . . let’s call it charm, to
proceedings.
Oh, and remember at the very start, someone
coming across the still warm corpse? That would be Michael Starkwedder,
an engineer working in the Middle East. His family came from the area
and he had been looking to buy a property nearby but had become
hopelessly lost in the fog, run his car into a ditch and stumbled his
way to the nearest house to ask for help . . . finding instead the now
late Richard.
It is a lovely performance from Al McCaughey as
the outsider who by chance finds himself embroiled in a murder mystery.
Starkwedder, along with Lauren Rote’s equally splendid Laura carry the
narrative along, holding all the threads together.
Starkwedder finds Richard dead and Laura holding
the gun but, despite her confession, allied, one must accept, to her
shock, he has doubts about her guilt. He becomes the unexpected guest
caught up by chance in the tangle of lies and deceit, would be alibis
and telling secrets as the truth slowly emerges.
We learn of enemies Richard had collected in his
less than amicable life, such as the gardener he had sacked in
acrimonious circumstances last year, or the road fatality the year
before that never went to court because of bare faced lies that everyone
but the police could see through, the charity worker he had shot at as
she ran for cover – indeed it was a life that seemed to have picked up
more enemies than friends, expanding the suspect pool accordingly.
Christie’s art is to keep you guessing, give you
suspects a plenty, each with opportunity and reason as their secrets are
exposed. She drops clues like trails of breadcrumbs that lead . . .
usually to the next in line as she makes the most innocent looking
character look guilty, forcing us to ignore first impressions and
question the truth of what anyone tells us, or indeed the whole concept
of justice, crime and punishment.
While not as famous as The Mousetrap or
And Then There Were None, this play has the signature Christie
collection of clever twists and clues you expect of her classic
detective mysteries. The result is a gripping, atmospheric whodunit
hiding its greatest twist to the final scene making it one for any fans of
Christie or thrillers.
Laura McCaughey’s set captures the play’s era
wonderfully well, the play premièred in 1958, and the excellent 10
strong cast keep things moving at a satisfying pace, fast enough to keep
interest alive but not so fast as to miss what could be a vital clue . .
. or, of course, another red herring . . .
Directed by Christine Bland, Richard will have
his brains blown out to 15-03-25.
Roger Clarke
07-03-25
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