by dick kerekes dickkerekes@yahoo.com
The Atlantic Beach Experimental Theatre opened its 2nd show of the season last weekend with the murder/mystery thriller A Party to Murder. Mystery fans will have until November 10 to solve the murder at the Adele Grage Culture Center in Atlantic Beach. Call 249-7l77 for information or to make reservations.
The quandary for reviewers of this type of show is how much can we tell without giving away too much and spoiling it. I will therefore keep my plot summary simple.
Six well-heeled people come to a secluded cottage on an island in a middle of a lake somewhere in the USA. It is successful mystery writer Charlie’s l0th annual Halloween murder mystery game, which requires an exclusive invitation because it’s expensive to attend, but the winner gets a fabulous prize of their choice. One year it was an all expense paid trip to Morocco, another year it was some rare jewelry.
This year’s winner Elwood (Wesley Nielsen) is a sharp businessman who owns 147 companies. What he wants as a prize is a favor of his choice from each of the other five participants. Did I mention he is a rather ruthless businessman and has even asked his long time mistress, the attractive McKenzie (Audrey Helow), for a life-changing favor?
Two sisters, Valarie (Korina Barber) and Henri (Laura A. Sauls), inherited a large utility company that Elwood wants to own. Willy (Robert Glazener), a former NFL football player now confined to a wheelchair, is asked something he is unwilling to do. Even the hostess, Charlie, is not spared by Elwood’s seemingly unreasonable wishes. Six unhappy people are a formula for mayhem.
Then, in a manner very similar to Agatha Christie’s Ten Little Indians, members of this gathering start to die off. Well, that is as far as I will take you. If you manage to figure who done it before the start of Act II, I will nominate you for President of the USA, since the country’s problems would be easier to solve, believe me.
Written by two Canadians, Marcia Kash and Douglas E. Hughes, it is a very cleverly constructed play and it keeps your interest till the very end. J.C. Wells, who is making his directorial debut at ABET, has cast the show well and has the actors using good vocal variety and direction so it is never static or slow.
Mr. Neilsen and Ms. Russe are both very polished performers with many shows to their credit, mostly in the beaches area. Bob Galzener, as Willy, provides most of the humor in the play and he is an accomplished character actor that is always fun to watch on stage. Korina L. Barber is a product of ABET’s acting workshops, and I am proud to say I have seen every one of her fine performances on local stages, including a trip to St. Augustine’s Limelight for Diary of Ann Frank and the world premiere of Strange Poison. Audrey Helow is a Douglas Anderson graduate who went on to the Florida State theater program. Audrey is leaving for New York after this show to pursue an acting career and additional schooling in the arts. Laura Sauls makes her acting debut with this show and has taken on a very large role for a beginner. Ms. Sauls performed this demanding part exceptionally well.
Shawn LeNoble is the production designer, which was built by several ABET volunteers, including the director and actors. It is a very cozy cottage complete with a secret passageway. Director Wells added some great music and sound effects. The storm and lightning were so realistic I kept looking out the window to see if I had rolled up my car windows. I really appreciated the excellent and well-styled program by ABET Artistic Director Celia Frank. It was a pleasure to read, and I always like pictures of the actors included. Director J. C. Wells is a Jacksonville University theater graduate, and you will see more of his talents as a director in the future, I am sure. He is an excellent actor as well, and won a best supporting actor award for Little Shop of Horrors at JU.
I highly recommend you spend a couple of hours playing detective in an entertaining evening of theatre at ABET, an excellent and intimate setting for this type of play.
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