CLUE


Audiences craving a cure for the summertime blues need look no further than Clue, eighty minutes of nonstop whodunit hilarity presented Live On Stage at the Ahmanson.

Board game fans know Clue as the longtime Parker Brothers (now Hasbro) favorite that has its two to six players competing to determine the who, the where, and the how of a recently committed murder.

Movie buffs will remember Clue from its 1985 film adaptation that had butler Tim Curry welcoming Eileen Brennan, Madeline Kahn, Christopher Lloyd, Michael McKean, Martin Mull, and Lesley Ann Warren to the murder mansion in the midst of the red-scare 1950s, a now cult classic that exposed three different killers depending on which version you happened to catch.

Sandy Rustin’s stage version (based on Jonathan Lynn’s screenplay, with additional material by Hunter Foster and Eric Price) gives audiences all that and more, and with the one-liners flying fast and furious and director Casey Hushion eliciting pitch-perfect rapid-fire comedic timing and bursts of side-splitting slapstick from a sensational touring cast just as she did at the La Mirada Theatre in 2021, there’s not a dull moment from start to finish.

The key question remains, who killed _____? (I’ll let Clue virgins discover the victim on their own.)

Was it (in order of appearance) Colonel Mustard (John Treacy Egan), a magisterial but slightly dim-witted military man; Mrs. White (Tari Kelly), elegant in the widow’s weeds she’s wearing for the fifth time so far; Mrs. Peacock (Joanna Glushak), a wealthy senator’s wife with more than a few bats in her belfry; Mr. Green (John Shartzer, reprising his La Mirada star turn), a mild-mannered State Department Employee with a sexual secret that dare not speak its name; Professor Plum (Jonathan Spivey), a pompous academic with a decidedly checkered past; or Miss Scarlet (Michelle Elaine), DC’s sultriest madam wearing curve-clinging red velvet befitting her name?

Or could it have been butler Wadsworth (Mark Price), French maid Yvette (Elisabeth Yancey) or The Cook (Mariah Burks) whodunit?

It doesn’t take long for Wadsworth to introduce the assembled guests to their host (Alex Syiek as Mr. Boddy), and soon enough there’s not just one dead body, the corpses just keep piling up.

Rustin’s script is jam-packed with jokes, some corny (Plum: It’s a long haul. Wadsworth: Indeed, it is a long hall. But then, it’s a very large house.”), some silly (White: We had a very humiliating confrontation. He had threatened to kill me in public. Scarlet: Why would he want to kill you in public?), all of them quite delish.

And there are just as many sight gags as there are scripted quips, with special snaps to L.A.’s very own Shartzer, who performs feats of physical elasticity normally reserved for Gumby, and Price, who performs a mile-a-minute recap of the evening’s events to do The Producers’ Max Bialystok proud.

Indeed it’s hard to imagine a more sensational comedy ensemble than the multitalented Egan, Elaine, Glushak, Kelly, Price, Shartzer, and Spivey, each of whom earns bonus points for a delightfully choregraphed sequence that turns Clue into an almost-musical midway through, and for executing Robert Westley’s athletic fight choreography.

Last but not least, the multitasking Burks, Syiek, and Teddy Trice deliver the laugh-getting goods in one outrageous cameo after another.

Lee Savage’s suitably dark-and-mysterious set reveals multiple surprises along the way to the unmasking of the killer(s); Jen Caprio’s terrific period costumes and J. Jared Janas’s matching hair, wig, and makeup designs evoke fond memories of both the 1950s and the ’85 cult movie favorite; and lighting designer Ryan O’Gara, composer Michael Holland, and sound designer Jeff Human keep things hilariously spooky and kooky from start to finish.

Steve Bebout is associate director. Casting is by Pearson Casting, CSA CDG. Greg Balla, Alison Ewing, Mary McNulty, and James Taylor Odom are understudies. Margot Whitney is production stage manager and Suzanne Prueter is company manager.

Clue doesn’t just guarantee the proverbial laugh a minute. Expect a new one to arrive every ten seconds or so in the most hilarious hit the Ahmanson has offered audiences since last summer’s Peter Pan Goes Wrong.

Ahmanson Theatre, 135 N Grand Ave, Los Angeles.
www.CenterTheatreGroup.org

–Steven Stanley
July 31, 2024
Photos: Evan Zimmerman for MurphyMade

 

Tags: , , ,

Comments are closed.