Murder On Air - Agatha Christie Theatre Company
Theatre Royal Windsor, April - May 2008

Review from the Slough and Windsor Express

by Francis Batt

There used to be a time when the old fashioned wireless reigned supreme. People did not have television so they gathered round the radio to get their daily diet of comedy, variety and drama. Famous writers like Agatha Christie used to write regularly for the medium and a fascinating new production currently running at Windsor’s Theatre Royal recreates those days. Agatha Christie’s Murder on Air consists of three genuine radio plays written by Dame Agatha for the BBC and performed on dates between 1937 to 1954.

They are being staged at Windsor by the Agatha Christie Theatre Company with different duos of star names performing on various nights. Martin Shaw, Jenny Seagrove, Susan George, Roy Marsden, Glynis Barber and Geraldine James are among the illustrious names that have been bringing the plays the life over the last 10 days. The plays are performed exactly as they would have been when people first heard them, the actors standing at microphones in a convincing mock-up of a radio studio - dressed in evening clothes reading from their scripts. A special effects man opens and shuts doors, ringing bells and picking up and putting down telephone receivers.

It all sounds irresistibly comic and the audience regularly rocked with laughter on the night I saw the plays. But here is the wonder of it. Bit by bit I got used to the fact the cast was standing at microphones and my mind started to create mental images of its own just as if I was listening to the radio.

I swear I can see the gruesome image in my head of a woman taking a hideous revenge on the man she holds responsible for her husband’s death. I can also see the image of a woman falling to her death in front of a train and of a waiter slyly slipping cyanide into a customer’s glass. Not bad - considering all I actually saw on stage was seven people standing at microphones with scripts.

On the night I saw the show Martin Shaw and Jenny Seagrove were playing the leads in the three plays, both bringing their professionalism and skill to characters ranging from Belgian detective Hercule Poirot to a scary murderess. Fans of Jenny will not need any reminders of how gloriously sinister and disturbing she can allow her rich golden voice to become.

A talented cast of five have completed the cast thoughout the run. Hilary Crane switches effortlessly from being a sinister voice on the phone to a fiery Peruvian dancer and a cockney landlady, while Elizabeth Price manages just as wide a range plus a lovely singing voice as a cabaret performer in a nightclub.

Damn it. I can see the nightclub in my mind’s eye too when I look back on the show - even though I can still only have been looking at seven people standing at a microphone.

This could be the future of theatre. Abolish the scenery and movement. Let the actors do it all with their voices.