Murder in the Dark, a spooky new play written by Torben Betts and produced by Original Theatre, is on at the Oxford Playhouse this week. I went along on opening night, hoping to be scared.
New Year’s Eve, a stormy night somewhere in rural England. Leaving his mother’s funeral, a washed-up pop star called Danny Sierra (Tom Chambers) crashes his car, leaving him, his girlfriend and his semi-estranged family stranded.
They seek refuge in the guesthouse on a nearby farm, owned by an eccentric, religious older lady, Mrs Bateman (Susie Blake), and guarded by her beastly dog (his barks and growls are heard from offstage). It’s rumoured Mrs Bateman found God in prison, after poisoning her late husband with wild mushroom soup. As she tells them repeatedly there’s no Wi-Fi, and no taxi will come out til the following morning, trust in her begins to falter. Meanwhile, inexplicable happenings start to occur.
Besides, Mrs Bateman, the other characters all orbit Danny - his sensible and concerned ex-wife (Rebecca Charles), angry teenage son (Jonny Green), steady and long-suffering older brother (Owen Oakeshott), and much younger trophy girlfriend (Laura White) - are all full of regrets and resentment, largely caused by him. Unfortunately, they verge into cliches at times, with neither the uniqueness to be compelling characters nor the emotional resonance to be archetypical.
Danny also uses regret, in addition to booze, to soften the clarity of his mistakes. Chambers plays him with a convincingly fickle, Matthew Perry-esque causticness.
The play has a slow start before its first scare, which would be more justifiable if the characters’ entanglements evolved more. While the characters openly voice their frustration with Danny, there’s not that much tension as no one seems to really need anything from one another.
On a similar note, I found myself wishing the play had committed more to a distinctive tone. It would’ve made a very sharp dark comedy, for instance, had it been more zany, or a macabre, gothic-tinged horror with chillier dialogue. Instead, the characters have a rather straightforward, middle-of-the-road feeling, like a soap opera.
The practical effects scares throughout were clever, if few and far between.
The play borrows from a wide range of reference points. It takes the repeated, spooky use of the nursery rhyme “Three Blind Mice” from Agatha Christie’s The Mousetrap. In its pacing and drip-feed of information, it reminded me quite a bit of 2:22: Ghost Story. There’s a whodunnit feeling to the range of characters all trapped together in a remote location, and elements from recent horror movies abound in the convoluted ending.
A lack of relatable emotional logic is particularly a problem in a spooky story, the implications painted in the audience’s imagination fuel far more of the horror than any jump scares or blackouts can. As the story ricocheted to its dramatic ending, so many threads were woven in that any level of tautness was lost and things began to feel contrived. One element of the final makes a lot of what has happened previously feel somewhat pointless. The ending felt as though it was written separately and tacked on for maximum twists and thrills, rather than building organically from what had come before.
To clarify, there is a lot to enjoy here. Susie Blake gives a thoroughly entertaining performance as Mrs Bateman. her deliberate evasions of the guests’ questions swing between humorous and menacing with ease.
At two hours with an interval, the show also doesn’t overstay its welcome, the scattering of scares are all well executed and effective. The acting, lighting and sound are all polished and convincing. While the story ultimately felt a bit hollow, it held my attention to its chaotic end and certainly felt very fitting for this season.