The Mousetrap Brisbane: The world’s longest play still surprises us | review

The secrets behind a hit Brisbane show will remain just that thanks to a unique pact. FULL REPORT

From L-R: Gerry Connolly (Mr Paravicini), Anna O’Byrne (Mollie Ralston) and Tom Conroy (Detective Sergeant Trotter).

The first thing that popped into my mind when I was watching The Mousetrap was ... thank God it’s not a musical.

OK - SPOILER ALERT - there is a little song at the end but that’s all I can say about the ending.

Because one of the secrets of success of this piece by Agatha Christie, which is the world’s longest running play, is that there is a pact between the cast and the audience to keep the ending a secret.

And no the butler didn’t do it and there isn’t even a butler in it anyway.

The genre is as familiar as my favourite old cardigan. I love Christie’s works and in our household we are huge Poirot fans.

So a night of Christie characters on stage is a treat and a delight and the opening night audience at the Playhouse QPAC on Saturday (where it is on until Nov 20) lapped it up and we were all totally engaged.

Anna O’Byrne is a delight as Mollie Ralston in The Mousetrap.

It’s a murder mystery but it’s also every funny and there are some lines worthy of Oscar Wilde early in the piece.

The veteran Australian thespian Robyn Nevin directed this 70th anniversary production for Australian audiences and it is masterfully executed with terrific performances from all concerned.

The setting is Monkswell Manor, an English country house where murder most foul occurs, as it often does, in books and on the screen at least.

Mollie Ralston (Anna O’Byrne) and her husband Giles (Alex Rathgeber) are running a bed and breakfast in the stately family pile and they are new at it.

The guests arrive and they are a motley crew - Christopher Wren (Laurence Boxhall who is hilarious) who claims to be an architect, the cantankerous Mrs Boyle (Geraldine Turner), a Major Metcalf (Adam Murphy) because it’s in the post war years, a Miss Casewell (Charlotte Friels), a Detective sergeant Trotter (Tom Conroy) and the mysterious unexpected guest Mr Paravicini played idiosyncratically and with great comic aplomb by Gerry Connolly.

Gerry Connolly is very very funny as Mr Paravicini in The Mousetrap.

It’s a great cast and Queenslanders Turner and Connolly shine and Turner’s Mrs Boyle reminded me so much of another cantankerous lady, a Mrs Richards who drives Basil Fawlty crazy in an episode of Fawlty Towers.

I think Mrs Richards might have been an homage to Christie because she and Mrs Boyle are very alike.

When one of the guests is murdered it seems a killer, who has killed before, is in the house and that means he or she is one of the guests.

But who is it? And can the resident copper get to the bottom of it?

I couldn’t guess and you probably won’t either unless someone tells you ... and that is verboten!

The Mousetrap is directed by the great Robyn Nevin.

It’s all very English and it’s just what we expect and want from Christie whose play has been running since 1952.

You may have seen it on London’s West End and if you have keep quiet about the denouement, please.

I haven’t said a word since I was instructed not to at the end of the show.

My lips are sealed. Because I want people to be as mystified and to have as much fun as I did watching this historical and very entertaining piece of theatre.

Oh yes, musicals are all well and good I suppose and they rake in the bucks for QPAC and other venues but I want to see more of this sort of thing, high calibre, accessible theatre for a broad audience.

This is so charming, such a treat and you’d be mad to miss it.