Theater Review “Dial M for Murder”

Theater Review - “Dial M for Murder” - Produced by: Smithtown Center for the Performing Arts - Reviewed by: Jeb Ladouceur

“Dial M for Murder” is one of those cute titles that is never used in the context of the play itself. The probable explanation is that the drama, originally written for a mass British television audience, premiered on the small screen in 1952, and like everything else sold on television, even then, the irrelevance of its name was considered of no consequence.

From BBC Television, this oh-so-English murder thriller with the catchy name moved to the West End in London (England’s theatrical equivalent of the Great White Way), thence stateside to Broadway, all in the same year.

Though the show was reasonably well-received on stage both here and abroad, it really found its niche in 1954 when Warner Brothers and the great Alfred Hitchcock picked it up and adapted the nail-biter for the American screen. With Ray Milland, Grace Kelly, and Robert Cummings in the lead roles and John Williams (not the composer) performing as the Chief inspector, “Dial M” was destined to be a hit.

This well-traveled drama, scheduled to run thru March 30 at the Performing Arts Center, Main Street, Smithtown, is actually an inverted detective story…or open mystery. That is to say, it reveals early on, the circumstances of the crime and its originator. Accordingly, the show has no whodunit element; the plot simply revolves around how the perpetrator, whose identity we know from the outset, will finally be exposed.

On the SPAC stage, the lovely Regina Schneider plays wealthy Margot Wendice, who’s had a previous fling with visiting TV mystery writer Max Halliday (acted with appropriately rising intensity by Steve Corbellini). Margot’s tennis bum husband Tony Wendice (Mark T. Cahill) never seems to have enough cash and he hires sappy Captain Lesgate (Eugene Dailey) to strangle his rich wife. Of course, the inevitable British policeman (Frank Russo playing Inspector Hubbard) shows up, puts two and two together in Peter Falk ‘Columbo’ fashion…and that’s that.

Essentially, this play belongs to Tony, whose lean figure and facial expressions are reminiscent of Lee Marvin or Vincent Price. From beginning to end Mark Cahill commands our attention, and during last weekend’s matinee performance the audience practically hissed at his every Iago-like move.

It would have been easy for Schneider, with her high-fashion figure and movements, to lend too much sophistication to the naive Margot, but to her credit she avoids that, and turns in a convincing interpretation of bad guy Tony’s confused and loving wife. Credit Director William B. Kahn for keeping his five actors in character throughout. He thus presides over a satisfying, well-paced drama.

In this presentation of “Dial M for Murder” costumer Ronald R. Green III met every requirement concerning early fifties garb, from Margot’s stunning cocktail dress, to Inspector Hubbard’s banal argyle sweater. The serviceable set worked well, and Chris Creevy’s lighting was masterfully done, especially during the attempted murder scene at midnight.

It must be said that, ‘open mystery’ or not, these inverted detective stories always contain an element of surprise. Accordingly, the more widely performed and better-known a play is, the less likely one is to be stunned by anything that happens along the way. This is especially true of Hitchcock-style dramas. Like Columbo or Sherlock Holmes episodes, they probably should come with warning labels…advising viewers not to reveal the twist that ultimately does the bad guy in.

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Award-winning Smithtown writer Jeb Ladouceur is the author of eight novels, and his theater reviews appear in several major L.I. publications. In Ladouceur’s next thriller, “Harvest” due in late summer, an American doctor is forced to perform illegal surgeries for a gang of vital organ traffickers in The Balkans.