Andrea Simakis Reviews “Game’s Afoot”

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Andrea "The Diva" Simakis is here to review Ken Ludwig's "Game's Afoot" which is playing at The Cleveland Playhouse, in her article Clever 'Game's Afoot' at the Cleveland Play House sports standout acting, a perfect period set:

Like any snappy, clever drawing-room mystery, there are twists in playwright Ken Ludwig's "The Game's Afoot" that cause the audience to gasp.

But theatergoers who filled the seats opening night also drew a collective breath when the curtain at the newly minted Allen Theatre rose to reveal the set, the baronial living room of Gillette Castle, home to American actor William Gillette.

With Arthur Conan Doyle's blessing, Gillette wrote the play "Sherlock Holmes," then performed the role of the brilliant sleuth onstage for decades, earning millions. He used the proceeds to build a stone fortress on the Connecticut River and outfitted it with newfangled inventions, such as the first intercom, and built mazes, hidden rooms and secret passageways into its floor plan.

On the stage at the Cleveland Play House, scenic designer Daniel Conway has re-created the grandeur and weirdness of Gillette's manor, complete with elaborately carved wood doors, a boar's head mounted above a soaring fireplace and a trick sconce that, when pulled, causes a wall to rotate, hiding a bookcase and replacing it with a glowing Deco bar. (It's 1936, after all).

The inventive set in this inspired whodunit is matched by spot-on period costumes -- a red-and-white tower of a hat that evokes Katharine Hepburn's millinery creations in "Bringing Up Baby" is especially mouthwatering.

The plot is pure Agatha Christie, played as farce, with a touch of "All About Eve": As Gillette takes his bows as Holmes at the Palace Theatre in New York, a shot rings out, wounding him in the arm. While recuperating at home, Gillette (Donald Sage Mackay, nicely channeling both the bombast of the celebrated actor and the odd-duck quality of Holmes) invites his co-stars to his Connecticut manse.

Read more at The Cleveland Plain Dealer