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Take Away the Lady

Full-Length Play, Drama  /  4w, 3m

Jimmie Chinn

Intriguing glimpses into a cupboard full of family skeletons, together with some serious, and not so serious, detective work, combine in this unusual suspense play, to keep everyone guessing until the very last page! Returning home from prison, after serving fifteen years for allegedly murdering his mother.

Take Away the Lady

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  • Cast Size
    Cast Size
    4w, 3m
  • Duration
    Duration
    105 Minutes
  • SubGenre
    Subgenre
    Mystery/Thriller
  • Audience
    Target Audience
    Appropriate for all audiences

Details

Summary
Take Away The Lady is another example of the sharp wit and observation of popular writer, Jimmie Chinn. Intriguing glimpses into a cupboard full of family skeletons, together with some serious, and not so serious, detective work, combine in this unusual suspense play, to keep everyone guessing until the very last page! Returning home from prison, after serving fifteen years for allegedly murdering his mother, Matthew finds his three sisters, his wife and his father waiting for him. Still protesting his innocence, Matthew's arrival prompts the question of who did kill Mother - scornful Celia, dotty Emma, cold Lavinia, flighty Gilda or even gentle Father? Accusations and hypotheses abound, but it takes an apparent suicide, and a good deal of amateur sleuthing, before the truth is revealed and the lady can be taken away...
History

The play was first presented as part of the Bedford Park Festival in June 1985 at the Studio Theatre, Bedford Park, Chiswick, London.

Keywords
Performing Groups
  • Time Period Present Day, 1990s, 1980s, 1970s, 1960s, 1950s
  • Setting A Drawing Room in Sussex.
  • Features Contemporary Costumes / Street Clothes
  • Additional Features Not Applicable
  • Duration 105 Minutes
  • Cautions
    • Smoking

Media

If you relish a finely tuned, old-fashioned English-drawing-room murder mystery, the kind where everyone has a bloody good motive for doing the dastardly deed — not once, but twice, mind you — then you'll feel all cosy and warm with Theatre Suburbia's fine production of Jimmie Chinn's deadly puzzler, Take Away the Lady.
Chinn's plays are a mixed bag, from dreamy idylls to interpersonal family dramas to this one, an Agatha Christie-esque murder mystery.
Set in a gloomy country house where tea is always served with fish-paste sandwiches and stiff upper-lip propriety, Chinn goes Christie one better by deftly incorporating the necessary exposition right at the start. Christie sometimes takes up the entire first act to set up her elaborate mousetrap plot machinery; Chinn simply begins. HOUSTON PRESS

Music

  • Musical Style N/A (Not a musical)
  • Vocal DemandsN/A (Not a musical)
  • Chorus Size N/A (Not a musical)

Licensing & Materials

  • Minimum Fee: £70 per performance plus VAT when applicable.

Scripts

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Authors

Jimmie Chinn

Jimmie Chinn

James 'Jimmie' Chinn was born in Middleton, Lancashire on March 30th 1940 - the only son of his beloved mother, Edie. His early years, although not always easy, were to shape his writing in the future, and this often difficult time compounded his determination to achieve grea ...

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