16: 2007 - A Murder Has Been Arranged

Very little set was involved in this production. It was actually written to be performed on the stage of the St James' Theatre in London in 1930, with the plot taking place at a private party on the stage. According to the script, it should be a plain interior set with a curtained alcove and a huge archway leading back into the depths of the theatre. Lacking that kind of depth, not to mention a certain amount of width, we opted for the design above. The alcove has become the only fixed item, as a free-standing curtained podium, and the archway leading to other parts of the building moved to the left wings exit. (In fact, I had wanted to reverse the positions of arch and alcove, but it proved impossible to fit the rest of the play around that configuration). Dust sheets over the furniture complete the illusion of a disused stage.

Being a large-cast play, even with so few items on stage, it proved tight at times and there were some difficult moves involved. Most of them centred around getting the murder victim - not surprisingly, given the title, there was one of those - into the alcove and subsequently getting his "ghost" out and back in again! Out was comparatively simple - with the front curtains of the alcove closed, he could sneak out of the stage right side, go around the back and come on as a ghost through the hallway. Getting back in, in full view of the audience, involved slipping into the dark shadows where the stage side black curtains meet the corner of the alcove, then ducking back in through the side of the alcove and getting into the chair before the  front alcove curtains were drawn back. It worked well...with a bit of practice!

Visually, the whole idea would have worked better in a larger space - which is presumably why the author picked a fair-size auditorium to work with. As it was, the starkness of the set came across well; it just wasn't possible to create the shadowed, vaulted darkness around it which would have been a perfect complement to the play atmosphere. Sometimes, though, that limitation of concept and compromise is exactly what has to happen with amateur theatre.