Do you fancy yourself as a murder mystery detective? Or a writer – this Agatha Christie style show might be for you! A Curious Demise, is an improvised murder mystery, and they use their long-form improv skills to create a short play using some suggestions from the audience.
As we enter the theatre, a guy with a rather dodgy moustache is brushing up and sets the tone for the show perfectly. With A Curious Demise, the show begins with a body, and the mystery is solved along the way by the cast developing the characters and the storyline naturally unfolds. But first, they must get some suggestions from the audience. Where has the body been found? – a greengrocers is suggested. The dear departed gentleman died holding something in his hand, what was that something? – a peperami.
And we’re off! The dead man is Philip Goldman III, a greengrocer who has a shop in a village close to Blackpool, he has two daughters Sara and Izzy, Sara being the bright one of the two. Their father is about to celebrate his 50th birthday and they are trying to organise a party for him, he insists he wear a crown, but Sara manages to convince him that he looks foolish, and he settles for a cool baseball cap worn backwards. This scene works very well, as it establishes straight away that they are a family, and that there is some tension there, as the sisters are not treated as equal as one is deemed to be less clever.
We then move on to friends of the sisters, who rent an apartment from Goldman, and hear that he has raised the rent again, even though they have mould growing which he will not sort out. A goalkeeper training with his coach is the next suspect, his skills are evident, and he plays for the local team Blackpool United, who Goldman decides to sponsor, putting the power of the greengrocers behind it.
If there is a shop involved in an improv show, then you can bet that a new Tesco will appear as competition, and so it did, and Goldman manipulates his tenants with promises of lower rent and towels, to spy for him. In the background, his new sponsorship deal including the goalkeeper is being pursued by Tesco, and guess who the goalkeeper would rather work with…?
After all of the above, the money-grabbing father of Sara and Izzy is about to get his comeuppance! They wish to retire him and send him to Barbados on a one-way ticket, saying that he is no longer of sound mind. They want to run the greengrocers their way. At this point, the team have done so well building the storyline, that we are eager for the final death scene, and to cut a long-form story short, the daughter did it, with the crown that she hated!
A very enjoyable show, with excellent improv skills displayed. I think it would be nice to have a few suggestions added in as they go along, which keeps the audience involved, but as each performer acts as a goader of their teammates, then I guess that they have chosen that route, to possibly keep the flow of the story moving.
A fun 50 minutes on a Saturday afternoon, and the show is on again at the Hen & Chickens Theatre next Saturday 15th August at 4.30pm. To book tickets go to – https://camdenfringe.com/events/a-curious-demise/
Reviewer: Caroline Worswick
Reviewed: 8th August 2026
North West End UK / Theatre Muse UK Rating:
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