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Gift of Murder!
Gift of Murder!
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Author: George Batson Publisher: Dramatists Play Service (cover may change) Format: Softcover # of Pages: 89 Pub. Date: 1974 ISBN-10: 0822204436 ISBN-13: 9780822204435 Cast Size: 5 female, 3 male
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About
the Play:
Gift of Murder! is a full-length comedic mystery thriller
by George Batson. The story of a famous actress, who has many
secrets in her past and more enemies than she realizes. Deftly
combining humour and suspense, Gift of Murder! brings together
a cast of thoroughly charming and witty "theatre people"
and plunges them into an ever-thickening plot of murder, mayhem, and
disguised identity.
Gift of Murder! is about an eccentric and beautiful actress
whose plan to relax at an English estate cottage is thwarted by the
arrival of fellow theatre people – and mayhem and murder. The scene
is a rented cottage in the north of England in the mid-1950s, where
the revered stage star Stella Cavendish, accompanied by her lovely
young niece, Mary, is recuperating from a hectic season and a bit too
much high living. They are looked after by a cook-housekeeper (and
local character) named Wimpi, and are soon joined by Dennis Mordaunt,
Stella's producer and would-be suitor, pitching her a new play, and
her fellow actress and arch rival, Flavia Dartega. Add in the
surprise appearance of Oliver Keane (Stella's former leading man) and
his dashing young nephew Peter (who is immediately captivated by
Mary), and both the plot and the romantic possibilities quicken. The
arrival of the bustling Nurse Pepper, sent by Stella's agent to see
to her recovery, rounds out the cast and begins the progression of
chilling (and frequently funny) events (including murder, actual and
attempted), leading on to the unexpected and ingeniously devised
denouement – in which the true identity of the villain is shielded
until the last possible moment.
Gift of Murder! has
been performed in regional, high school, college, and community
theatre productions.
Cast: 5 female, 3 male
What people say:
"George Batson
... has crafted a nifty British drawing-room comedy-mystery spiced
with tons of references to the thea-tah." — Backstage
About the Playwright:
George D. Batson (1916-1971) was a prolific American
playwright specializing in comedies and farces. As a screenwriter, he
contributed to several television anthology series in the 1950s,
including Actors Studio, The Clock, Lights Out, The Bigelow Theater,
and Climax! He also was active as a producer in England and in
American stock and repertory theatre.
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George Batson and Jack Kirkland
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