The Mirror Crack'd sees Marina Gregg, an American movie star, moving to the area following her purchasing the home of a close friend of Miss Marple. She is here, it transpires to make a movie, however during a drinks gathering at her home, Heather Leigh, the local St John’s Ambulance Chair succumbs to the perils of a poisoned Strawberry Daquiri. However, was she the true target, or was that drink meant to be for someone far more famous?
All of this intrigue is played out right in the opening minutes of the play and presented in perhaps the most intriguing part of this new dramatisation by Rachel Wagstaff. You see, Miss Marple has injured her ankle, and while knitting away, her friends including Chief Inspector Craddock recall the events while the scenes are played out by the characters around her in her home via flashback. It is a quite brilliant concept and allows the story also to be told a number of different ways until finally all is revealed. Wagstaff is to be applauded for bringing such new energy and ideas to telling this sixty-year-old tale, and alongside Philip Franks's direction, the whole show is a delight. Perhaps Agatha Christie diehard fans might occasionally baulk at some of the liberties and changes to the story, but, to hear Miss Marple utter the (very minor) expletive actually adds a little extra mischievous giggle to the audience.
It is a delight to see Sophie Ward onstage again for a third time, here playing movie star Marina Gregg with a huge dollop of Hollywood beauty and aloofness. Her evolution of character is beautifully portrayed by her. Veronica Roberts is a delight as Miss Marple's friend Dolly, sharing some lovely playful scenes with Blake. Mara Allen is equally huge fun as Cherry Baker, Miss Marple's housekeeper, and I delighted at David Partridge as Cyril, eager to say something, but never being important enough to matter to others to get to say it. Some lovely comic touches and reactions. Indeed the whole cast is fabulous and beyond their characters, they make the occasional complicated scene changes not become tiresome as they always make sure something interesting is still going on.
Adrian Linford's set design thrills and annoys in equal measure. It looks rather splendid in its simplicity of a glass passageway, which, with the assistance of the cast, rotates at scene changes and has activity that plays out within during the scenes in front. It is an interesting concept, however, for myself, seated to the left of the audience (facing the stage), manages to steal much of the fun of its use. The first main scene sees Craddock "depart" Miss Marple's home, however, he doesn't and lurks in the background, but I hardly saw him, or any reactions he made during the unfolding scene. The corridor tilts you see at this stage in favour of the right of the audience, and despite an earnest attempt to create a reflective side panel, any of his actions at this stage are lost. Maybe it is a minor point to bring up, however, it comes as a disappointment in what otherwise is a superb concept of a set.
These grievances aside, however, there is no question that The Mirror Crack'd is an excellent evening of entertainment. It is quietly thrilling as Christie can only be, full of the usual intrigue, and without question, so much funnier than you would ever expect. The show has sold extremely well, but, if you can grab a ticket while this is in town, I very much doubt that you will be a disappointed theatregoer!
Nothing is cracking in this highly entertaining production of a Christie classic.
⭐⭐⭐⭐½
