Sandy Rustin Archives - North West End UK

28Jun

By Scot CunninghamNo Comments

North West

Cluedo – The Lowry

Colonel Mustard, with the dagger…in the theatre? Out of the box and on to the stage, family favourite boardgame Cluedo rolls up for an evening so fun it’s lethal. The plot is based on that of the 1985 film Clue: the 6 familiar suspects show up at Boddy Manor having all been mysteriously invited there, where a revelation from their host sets in motion a sequence of surprising events. Direction from Mark Bell, of The Play That Goes Wrong fame, gives cause for excitement for all the farcical comedy fans this show is designed to attract. However, Sandy Rustin’s vanilla script limits this adaptation to the appeal of a second-hand game with the instructions missing. There is chucklesome physical humour, most regularly delivered by the floundering Reverend Green (Tom Babbage): his being...

Cluedo – Sheffield Lyceum

The maid, in the hall, with the champagne! That is how Wadsworth the butler greets us, and the six guests who each received a mysterious invitation, as we enter Boddy Manor. Most, if not all of us, will be familiar with Miss Scarlett, Professor Plum, Mrs Peacock, Reverend Green, Mrs. White and Colonel Mustard, the protagonists of the now 70-year-old board game, Cluedo, on which this play is based; and now we get to meet them in the flesh. They arrive in time for dinner, but the staff are acting strangely, and the evening soon comes to an unforeseen halt, as a body is discovered in the study. But… who was it that brought the evening to its arresting conclusion? The script by Sandy Rustin, based on Jonathan Lynn’s original screenplay, is full of clever nods to the board game, snapp...

Cluedo – King’s Theatre, Edinburgh

An irresistible invitation from Lord Boddy brings the seemingly unconnected Colonel Mustard (played by Wesley Griffith), Miss Scarlett (Michelle Collins), Reverend Green (Tom Babbage), Professor Plum (Daniel Casey), Mrs Peacock (Judith Amsenga) and Mrs White (Etisyai Philip) to a country house one dark and stormy evening. Soon the connections, motives and corpses begin piling up as the mystery and hysteria grows. Who is doing the killing? Was it Miss Scarlett, with the revolver in the dining room, or Professor Plum, with the lead pipe in the library? Despite the familiar name, Cluedo is a new piece of work. That is to say, it's a new British play based on an older American play based on an 1985 American film (staring Tim Curry and Christopher Lloyd), based on a 1949 British board...