Stormy Weather: A Handsome but Uneven An 'Old Fashioned Family Murder' at Vienna Theatre Company
Updated: 6 days ago
Hot Take
Vienna Theatre Company’s An Old Fashioned Family Murder is a treat for the eyes and a game of dress-up the whole cast clearly loves. What it lacks is nerves. Nobody in this mansion acts like a killer is down the hall, and a whodunit without worry is just a pleasant evening in a lovely room.
Setting the Scene
Katie Boone directs with a steady, tidy hand. She gets every department pulling in one direction, which is why the evening feels like a single, consistent slice of 1943. The Claythorne drawing room has real texture, thanks to Michelle Lukacs. The furniture is right-sized for the cast, with enough places to sit and no clutter in the way. Juliana Cofrancesco and Farrell Hartigan choose silhouettes and fabrics that sell the era without winking at it. For example, Clarice and Dotty's outfits tell us everything about them before they say a word.
Suspects and Alibis
Eddie Perez-Reyes gives Detective Peck a clear goal and the show its only real urgency, but the character needs more of an arc than he gets. Samantha Mitchell is steady as Dotty, though I wanted bigger choices in her fandom of Whittington. It could have been a swoon, a clutched book, a gasp when he enters, anything other than dialogue to show she’d read every one of his books twice. Charlie Boone blusters happily as Whittington, and Michelle Kritzler’s Mrs. Peck is the sharpest mind in the house, but both fall into presentational acting traps. Often lines go out to the audience instead of to each other, and Kritzler's maternal warmth the part needs never arrives. Still, her quiet reaction shots while the others bicker are a delight, and she makes you believe she’s three steps ahead.
Taveion Mickens is a gem as Jasper, a clownish physical and vocal comic who gets regularly gets the night's the biggest laughs. His status change toward the end is a fun resolution. Ansley Sherwin makes Clarice an ice queen you can’t look away from. A single arched eyebrow does more work than most of the dialogue. Her partnership with Jasper, however, never sparks, and the engagement they’re supposed to share reads more like a seating chart.
Dead Air
Myer Kim’s storm is a good idea that needs another pass. It sometimes swallows the dialogue, stops and restarts without warning, and ends with a hard cut. There were also pauses where I couldn’t tell whether the actors or the booth were waiting for each other, and a few scene changes took a long time with nothing visibly happening.
The Blackbox Grit
Mysteries run on detail, and a few were fumbled. Whittington says every word he’s “typing” while tapping a few keys, slowly. Jasper’s dismissive “psshh” sounds more like 1993 than 1943. The final tea “pour” is so quick that nothing visibly leaves the pot. Spoiler alert: when a body (or the lack of one) is revealed, the cast reacts before they can process it, which deflates the moment. Cumulatively, these details and others really effect the integrity of the story.My instincts tell me that this show would've worked better with a heavier directorial hand stringing the story together.
The Verdict: YELLOW LIGHT
Pretty, good-natured, and a bit too relaxed to thrill. Add some height and danger for this show to really hit.
The Details
An Old Fashioned Family Murder is playing through November 1 at the Vienna Community Center (120 Cherry Street SE, Vienna, VA), presented by Vienna Theatre Company. Evening performances are October 16, 17, 23, 24, and 30 at 7:30 p.m.; matinees are October 18, 25, and November 1 at 2:00 p.m. Written by Joe DiPietro. Directed by Katie Boone. Running time is 2 hours, including a 15-minute intermission. Visit https://www.viennatheatrecompany.org/ for information and tickets.
