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Peer Reviews Murder
by Shadow: The Ghost of Walewind Castle Entire contents are copyright © 2007, Craig Nolan Highley. All rights reserved.
The first thing you need to know about WhoDunnit's latest interactive murder mystery is, you don't need to know anything. It is billed as another chapter in the continuing story of Dr. Angus MacCrimmon and his ongoing search to discover what happened to his wife, but the story in this chapter is self-contained and easily one of the most entertaining examples I have yet seen of this type of theatre. This time out, our intrepid doctor is summoned to a haunted tourist inn located in Rhode Island in 1910. He has a rather unusual mystery to solve: the inn's biggest tourist draw, a headless ghost, has disappeared. Mrs. Sayres, the lady who runs the inn, believes someone has done away with the spirit and wants Dr. MacCrimmon to solve the crime. MacCrimmon not only has to figure out how one goes about murdering a ghost, but is also presented with another mystery: who killed Mrs. Sayres' husband twenty years ago? I have not seen the other four MacCrimmon plays, but I have seen several of the other WhoDunnit interactive mysteries and have to say this is one of their best yet. It’s a surprisingly complex little story, and although the clues are there, I admit I for one didn’t figure it out. x
x Writer-director A.S. Waterman has assembled a strong cast and makes creative use of a very small stage. There were a few flubbed lines here and there, but all of the performers were quite good, especially in the transitional moments when they mingled and conversed with the audience. I managed to speak to all of the characters at one point or another, and the actors maintained the illusion throughout. It was quite fun. Frank Whitaker, who has played MacCrimmon in all four previous plays and again here, has obviously gotten comfortable in the role. Among the suspects, Niles Welch is amusing as the mysterious old man Bent, and Graham Bell makes an impressive acting debut as the stuffy Commodore Fitch. The standout performance, however, is Cristina Martin as Countess Piroska Mellesne. She has created a larger-than-life character who sounds like a bride of Dracula and looks like a cross between one of the witches from Macbeth and the old gypsy woman from The Wolf Man. Her prosthetic nose also looked like it could cut glass! If you’re looking for an unusual evening of theatre, you could do worse than to spend an evening with WhoDunnit’s latest. And you get dinner, too! Murder by Shadow: The Ghost of Walewind
Castle WhoDunnit Murder Mystery Theater Featuring Graham Bell, Erica Goldsmith, Erica Kelly, Cristina Martin, Niles Welch and Frank Whitaker Posted October 1, 2007
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