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Murder Mystery Plays You Need to Know

Murder mystery plays draw us into worlds filled with deception, danger, and sometimes even a bit of comedy! These whodunits keep us on the edge of our seats, unraveling secrets with each clue and providing the audience with an unforgettable night of spine-tingling twists.

Clue: On Stage Based on the screenplay by Jonathan Lynn, Written by Sandy Rustin, Additional Material by Hunter Foster & Eric Price

Based on the iconic 1985 Paramount movie which was inspired by the classic Hasbro board game, Clue is a hilarious farce-meets-murder mystery. The tale begins at a remote mansion, where six mysterious guests assemble for an unusual dinner party where murder and blackmail are on the menu. When their host turns up dead, they all become suspects. Led by Wadsworth – the butler, Miss Scarlet, Professor Plum, Mrs. White, Mr. Green, Mrs. Peacock and Colonel Mustard race to find the killer as the body count stacks up. Clue is the comedy whodunit that will leave both cult-fans and newcomers in stitches as they try to figure out…WHO did it, WHERE, and with WHAT!

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Deathtrap by Ira Levin

Comfortably ensconced in his charming Connecticut home, Sidney Bruhl, a successful writer of Broadway thrillers, is struggling to overcome a dry spell which has resulted in a string of failures and a shortage of funds. A possible break in his fortunes occurs when he receives a script from a student in the seminar he has been conducting at a nearby college—a thriller that Sidney recognizes immediately as a potential Broadway smash. Sidney’s plan, devised with his wife’s help, is to offer collaboration to the student for co-credit. Or is it? Deathtrap provides twists and turns of devilish cleverness, and offers hilariously sudden shocks in such abundance that audiences will be spellbound until the very last moment.

The Da Vinci Code adapted by Rachel Wagstaff and Duncan Abel, based on the Novel by Dan Brown

In this thrilling play, based on Dan Brown’s bestselling international phenomenon, Professor Robert Langdon is called to the Louvre in the dead of night, where he unwittingly becomes the center of a murder investigation. When cryptologist Sophie Neveu arrives at the scene, she alerts Robert that, not only is he being asked to solve the crime, he is also the prime suspect. Soon they are in a race against time to clear Robert’s name and decipher a labyrinthine code before a shocking historical secret is lost forever. From Paris to London and beyond, follow along with two of your favorite characters as they solve this pulse-racing mystery.

Dial “M” for Murder by Frederick Knott

Tony Wendice has married his wife, Margot, for her money and now plans to murder her for the same reason. He arranges the perfect murder. He blackmails a scoundrel he used to know into strangling her for a fee of one thousand pounds, and arranges a brilliant alibi for himself. Unfortunately…the murderer gets murdered and the victim survives. But this doesn’t baffle the husband: He sees his hireling’s death as an opportunity to have his wife convicted for the murder of the man who tried to murder her, and that is what almost happens. Luckily, the police inspector from Scotland Yard and a young man who is in love with the wife discover the truth, and in a scene of almost unbearable suspense they trap the husband into revealing his guilt, thus freeing Margot.

An Inspector Calls by J.B. Priestley

The action of the play occurs in an English industrial city, where a young girl commits suicide and an eminently respectable British family is subject to a routine inquiry in connection with the death. An inspector calls to interrogate the family, and during the course of his questioning, all members of the group are implicated lightly or deeply in the girl’s undoing. The family, closely knit and friendly at the beginning of the evening, is shown up as selfish, self-centered or cowardly, its good humor turning to acid, and good fellowship to dislike, before the evening is over. The surprising revelation, however, is in the inspector—who turns out to be no copper at all but a mysterious individual with full knowledge of everyone’s connection with the suicide. After the false inspector has been shown up, and it is discovered that no suicide had been recorded, an actual copper shows, and a last-minute suicide is reported, which ties in mysteriously with the foregoing.

The Suffragette’s Murder by Sandy Rustin

It’s the morning of July 5, 1857, and the tenants of Mayhew’s Boarding House on New York’s Lower East Side are getting ready for a busy day. They’re an odd bunch, given their surroundings. Among them are a mute, an Irishman, a gay Black man, two Southern Belles, and the Mayhews themselves — a husband and wife team committed to advancing the women’s suffrage movement. As they prepare to host an important gathering, they receive an unexpected visit from a constable. One of the tenants has been murdered. Hilarious hijinks ensue, amidst the backdrop of a murder mystery, as the tenants band together to conceal their involvement in the suffrage movement and improvise an elaborate ruse to throw the constable off their scent. The investigation, however, reveals much more than murder motives and rabble-rousing. It becomes an examination of human rights, the struggle to define “a woman’s place,” and political systems that have historically sought to snuff out feminist voices.

Holmes and Watson: The Game’s Afoot adapted by Jon Jory

When desperate people come to 221B Baker Street in search of aid, Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson are always there to help. But this quartet of conundrums will put even Holmes’ deductive genius and Watson’s stout heart to the test. The remarkable duo must match wits with a dastardly blackmailer, recover a coronet of priceless gems, trace a vanished bride, and solve a murder so strange that Watson considers it the most singular of all their cases. Based on four classic short stories by Arthur Conan Doyle, Holmes and Watson: The Game’s Afoot is both a gripping mystery and a celebration of enduring friendship.

The 39 Steps: A Live Radio Play by Joe Landry

Inspired by Hitchcock’s classic tale and performed as a live period radio play, this romantic thriller is a fast-paced ride through the signature world of the Master of Suspense. Richard Hannay is visiting 1930s London when he meets Annabella Smith, who is on the run from foreign agents, after a disturbance at a music hall. Later that night, Annabella is murdered and Hannay must then try to break the spy ring and prove his innocence. From an epic train chase to a feisty love interest, Hannay has his work cut out for him as he searches for the truth about The 39 Steps.

Arsenic and Old Lace by Joseph Kesselring

Drama critic Mortimer Brewster’s engagement announcement is upended when he discovers a corpse in his elderly aunts’ window seat. Mortimer rushes to tell Abby and Martha before they stumble upon the body themselves, only to learn that the two old women aren’t just aware of the dead man in their parlor, they killed him! Between his aunts’ penchant for poisoning wine, a brother who thinks he’s Teddy Roosevelt, and another brother using plastic surgery to hide from the police—not to mention Mortimer’s own hesitancy about marriage—it’ll be a miracle if Mortimer makes it to his wedding. Arsenic and Old Lace is a classic black comedy about the only thing more deadly than poison: family.

The Musical Comedy Murders of 1940 by John Bishop

The creative team responsible for a recent Broadway flop (in which three chorus girls were murdered by the mysterious “Stage Door Slasher”) assemble for a backer’s audition of their new show at the Westchester estate of a wealthy “angel.” The house is replete with sliding panels, secret passageways, and a German maid who is apparently four different people—all of which figure diabolically in the comic mayhem which follows when the infamous “Slasher” makes his reappearance and strikes again—and again. As the composer, lyricist, actors, and director prepare their performance, and a blizzard cuts off any possible retreat, bodies start to drop in plain sight, knives spring out of nowhere, masked figures drag their victims behind swiveling bookcases, and accusing fingers point in all directions. However, and with no thanks to the bumbling police inspector who snowshoes in to investigate, the mystery is solved in the nick of time and the “Slasher” unmasked—but not before the audience has been treated to a sidesplitting good time and a generous serving of the author’s biting, satiric, and refreshingly irreverent wit.

A Sherlock Carol by Mark Shanahan

Moriarty is dead, to begin with. And Sherlock Holmes is a haunted man. But, when a grown-up Tiny Tim asks Holmes to investigate the death of Ebenezer Scrooge, the Great Detective must use his gifts to solve a Dickens of a Christmas mystery! Six actors take on the beloved characters of Arthur Conan Doyle and Charles Dickens in this heartwarming and highly theatrical holiday treat for all ages!

 

The Play That Goes Wrong by Henry Lewis, Jonathan Sayer & Henry Shields

From Mischief, Broadway masters of comedy, comes the smash hit farce. Welcome to opening night of the Cornley University Drama Society’s newest production, The Murder at Haversham Manor, where things are quickly going from bad to utterly disastrous. This 1920s whodunit has everything you never wanted in a show—an unconscious leading lady, a corpse that can’t play dead, and actors who trip over everything (including their lines). Nevertheless, the accident-prone thespians battle against all odds to make it through to their final curtain call, with hilarious consequences! Part Monty Python, part Sherlock Holmes, this Olivier Award-winning comedy is a global phenomenon that’s guaranteed to leave you aching with laughter!

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Sherlock Holmes and the Ice Palace Murders by Jeffrey Hatcher, based on the novel by Larry Millett

In 1896, the Winter Carnival is in full swing, but St. Paul’s wealthiest man has lost his head—literally. A young man disappears just before his wedding, and his fiancée has already given back her wedding dress. When a gruesome discovery is made in the Ice Palace, there’s only one man for the job. Sherlock Holmes is summoned to solve a mystery that’s hardly elementary. With the help of trusty Watson and Irish barkeep Shadwell Rafferty, it’s up to Holmes to track a cold-blooded killer from the icy streets of St. Paul to the frozen Mississippi River.

Deadline by Marcia Kash, Douglas E. Hughes

Just as they are about to give up on their careers, a pair of struggling playwrights find out that their mentor, the most celebrated murder mystery writer since Agatha Christie, has just died with the script to his upcoming Broadway thriller left unfinished. Tasked with completing his work in under a week, Mara and Don jump into the story—but once they begin digging into the world of the play, they quickly find themselves trapped inside it. Can they use their writing skills to solve the mystery and save the play—and themselves?

 

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