Knights Theater Company Presents: Clue

On a dark, stormy night, six people are invited to a mansion, and over the course of night, six more people die, unveiling a government conspiracy that goes deeper than anyone knew before. Clue is the classic Hasbro game, and cult-classic movie from 1985, and now it’s the most recent show from ACP’s own Knights Theater Company, featuring stunning sets combined with excellent actors, comedy, murder, and delights all around. The Lead Pipe cast (the show I saw) was excellent because of all of this and more.

SPOILER ALERT AHEAD: IF YOU CONTINUE READING THERE WILL BE SPOILERS FOR CLUE

Starting the night off, we see Wadsworth (played by Griffin Slivka) tell Yvette (Alaina Mowrey) to turn off the T.V. (giving us 50’s style news reports on McCarthyist Policies in the government), and to prepare for the guests to arrive, at that moment the doorbell rings showing us: Colonel Mustard (Joseph Fortunato), who is reclining in the sitting room. He is soon joined by Mrs. White (Marley Burns); shocked by the presence of Yvette. The hostess, Mrs. Peacock (Nina Sreeprasad), shocked by the cook, enters next. Soon the nervous Mr. Green (Joey Beaudreux) enters, after being startled by the dogs outside. And finally Professor Plum (Geewoo Song) and Ms. Scarlet (Adeline Carder) arrive together, unbeknownst to both of them. After our main eight are all seated together, dinner shenanigans ensue and the cast is led back into the sitting room where Wadsworth reveals that they are all there for a reason (bum bum bummmmmmmm).

It turns out that the distinguished Colonel Mustard, the widowed Mrs. White, the senator’s wife Mrs. Peacock, the nervous Mr. Green, the ex-doctor Plum, and the scandalous Ms. Scarlett all live in DC, and are all connected by their host and their blackmailer for the night: Mr. Boddy. He reveals himself (or does he?) and gives all of his “guests” a gift: six murder weapons, one for each of them: Mustard had the wrench, White had the rope , Peacock got the dagger, Green had the lead pipe, Plum had the revolver, and Scarlett had the candlestick . After giving the weapons to the cast, Mr. Boddy tells them he will stop blackmailing them if one of them can kill Wadsworth when he turns the lights out. The lights go out, screaming, a gunshot. The lights turn on and the seven stare at Mr. Boddy’s dead body.

Yvette screams from the other room, causing the seven to rush to her assistance (Peacock suspiciously shows up later); apparently she was just screaming for no reason. They return to find Boddy’s body gone. Peacock goes to the restroom and finds Boddy yet again (really dead this time, I swear). The next few bits of the show are mostly filler, so here are the important parts: The group searches the kitchen, the chef is dead. They lock the murder weapons in a secret safe and throw the keys outside. A motorist comes by and uses the phone, lights go out, he dies. A police officer comes out, they fake having a party to dissuade any suspicion. There’s an excellent chase scene (with intermittent comedy bits) and then we have intermission.

The next deaths are simultaneously the Officer and Yvette (taking our main eight to seven) and the random death of a singing telegram. Both bodies are discovered, bringing our party back down to the foyer, and its time to figure out who the real killer is. Wadsworth leads our motley crew through the events of the night, leading Scarlett to accuse Plum, cops rush in and the play is over, right? Wrong! Time rewinds upon itself and we’re brought back to the accusation: Plum accuses Mustard, cops rush in again and we’ve gotten the true ending, right? Nope! The Colonel has his own accusation: Ms. White, cops rush in (yet again) ending this long saga of wrong accusations… right? Nope! There’s still one final surprise the (true) ending.

In a stunning series of revelations, it’s revealed that Wadsworth is actually Mr. Boddy, and Mr. Boddy is actually Wadsworth. And that the six deaths that happened tonight were by five of the six guests, along with the real Mr. Boddy: Wadsworth by Boddy, Singing Telegram by Plum, the Motorist by Mustard, the Officer by Scarlett, and the Chef by Peacock. But there’s one more surprise for tonight: Mr. Green is actually Larry Goodman, a secret agent from the FBI sent to arrest the very people we’ve been watching this whole time. He shoots Boddy/Wadsworth and then Griffin Slivka gives one of if not the best death scene known to mankind, police rush in and the show is (finally) over.

All in all, Clue was a top-notch performance from the cast as well as the crew behind the scenes, the sets were superb, the sounds were groovy, and everyone involved with this show truly followed the PREP way. Go Knights!