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Reviews Murder on the Nile Reviewed by Sherry Deatrick Entire contents are copyright © 2009 Sherry Deatrick. All rights reserved.
It was a dark and stormy night. No really, it was raining incessantly on opening night of Murder on the Nile at Clarksville's Derby Dinner Playhouse. Perfect weather for an exotic murder mystery. It was my friend's birthday, so I finally got to experience the chocolate cake delivery during the Footnotes' pre-show entertainment. What a fun way to end the meal. Sparks fell harmlessly onto the delicious buttercream frosting until the sparkler sadly died out. The bountiful buffet, as usual, holds a variety of food that will satisfy most palates. The salad bar is especially excellent, and it's not all salad. You'll find marinated beans, beets, and broccoli along with the traditional salad ingredients. Main courses include fried chicken, fried fish, roast beef, roast pork and turkey, accompanied by scalloped potatoes, mixed vegetables, green beans, pasta, and I'm surely forgetting some of the other dishes. Helpful, friendly wait staff keep your glasses full and unobtrusively remove dinnerware from the tables. Lee Buckholz has decked out the stage as a luxury steamer lounge -- with rattan chairs covered in orange floral upholstery, fancy overhead fans, lush tropical plants -- and it nicely suggests British imperialism in the 1940's. (Note for history purists - Although Egypt was granted independence in 1922, it continued to be a British client state until 1954.) Costumes, by Butch Sager, capture the proper British attire of the time period. The Egyptian crew and bead sellers (all played by Tony Smith) are exotically attired. The Arabian music during transitions guides you along rapturously. The play began its life under a different name, Moon on the Nile, morphed into a novel called Death on the Nile, and back into a play after an actor friend was looking for a role as Hercule Poirot. Christie, bored with Poirot, agreed to rewrite the play but created a new character, Canon Pennefather, as the play's focal point. The first act is bogged down by mouthfuls of expository dialogue and repeated introductions as new characters arrive on the ship for a cruise on the Nile. Miss ffoliot-ffoulkes (the uproarious Rita Thomas) is a snobbish middle-aged woman attended by her shrinking violet niece, Christina (Michelle Johnson). Thomas practically sings her lines as the nosy matronly woman, her voice going up when conversing with the wealthy young newlyweds, and down when addressing the "socialist" passenger, William Smith (Scott Michael). She's the aunt you love to hate. The newlyweds, Simon and Kay Mostyn (Matt Wallace and Janet Essenpreis), with French maid Louise (Abigail Bailey Maupin) in tow, can't seem to get away from family and friends on their honeymoon. Fellow passengers include Canon Pennefather (J.R. Stuart) is Kay's uncle and former guardian. And Simon's ex-girlfriend (also Kay's ex-best friend) Jacqueline (Tina Jo Wallace) climbs aboard at the last minute. She's been stalking the couple in their world travels, turning up "coincidentally" wherever they appear. (Ah, the idle rich who have nothing better to do than take world cruises and sip gin fizzes day and night.) Likewise, Canon Pennefather just "happens" to turn up on board, but he admits there's no such thing as coincidence. Rounding out the passenger list is Dr. Bessner (David Myers), a psychologist who is fond of giving injections to anyone who'll hold still long enough. Without giving away the plot, someone is murdered on the ship, as you can surely guess from the title. Everyone is a suspect. Red herrings abound and are repeated a few times to reel you in. However, you will probably figure out "whodunit" easily enough as the more lively second act unfolds, despite some second guessing. As we were leaving the show, I overheard a gentleman saying "I thought the butler did it." He was joking, of course. The play is rather old-fashioned in its structure, and everyone (except the Egyptian crew and bead-sellers) speaks in a British accent. For the most part, the accents are realistic and intelligible. Ron Breedlove's effective use of flickering lights to symbolize moonlight on the Nile is a nice touch, but the night lighting sometimes obscured Louise's face as she is being questioned about the murder. The stifling heat is almost palpable due to the harsh yellow lights on the orange and tan furnishings. Stuart, as Canon Pennefather, stumbled over quite a few of his many lines on opening night but this did not detract much from his acting skill. Matt Wallace, last seen in Leading Ladies at Derby Dinner, threw himself into the role of Simon as well as anyone could, without overplaying his role, by the use of subtle gestures. It would have been easy to ham up that part, what with the hobbling about after being shot in the leg by his former girlfriend. But it's not a very well-defined character so there's not much to work with. Tina Jo Wallace (Matt's wife, also last seen in Leading Ladies) turns in an excellent performance as the stalking ex with an axe to grind against both Simon and Kay, and puts herself squarely in the moment during her "dark night of the soul." Jon Huffman's ship's steward is menacingly creepy. Michelle Wagoner Johnson (last seen in the demanding role of Narrator in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat tends to overact as the hysterical Christina who sticks like glue to the drunken Jacqueline. David Myers provides comic relief as the needle-wielding psychologist. Abigail Bailey Maupin is delightfully deadpan as the haughty, put-upon French maid, delivering her lines with dignity in the midst of the silly upper class passengers who, like Miss ffoliot-ffoulkes, can't seem to function without copious help. Overall, the show is entertaining, and the cast (as usual at Derby Dinner) is top-notch. The play is a mixture of humor and serious drama, but the characters are not well-drawn, making the moral dilemma at the play's ending seem forced.
Featuring Michelle Wagoner Johnson, J.R. Stuart, Matthew Wallace, Tina Jo Wallace, David Myers, Abigail Bailey Maupin, Janet Essenpreis, Scott Michael, Rita Thomas, Jon Huffman, and Tony Smith.
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