CLUE

I loved, loved, loved this show at the Ahmanson! It’s the perfect entertainment. For once, I have not even one negative thing to say! Everyone who needs (or just enjoys) a good laugh must see it!

You have to understand how much I wanted to see Clue for me to choose to leave the house for it during the Summer Olympics! That never happens! I don’t even know why I wanted to see the show so much; I had never heard anything about the play nor even the movie it’s based on. But I’ve loved the board game* my whole life, and I love the Ahmanson Theatre, so I guess that combo had piqued my interest. And I was rewarded royally. *[Note: Even though I haven’t played the game in decades, I actually know where my own Clue box is in my way-too-cluttered house! I perhaps nuttily checked that it was indeed where I thought it was when I got home from opening night. Now I just have to find a handful of fun friends to play it with me! After the Olympics, of course.]

The play is, (as you would expect,) based on that classic board game of the same name, and in turn, the movie, which, somehow, I had never even heard of, even though I became friends with one of its stars, Martin Mull, some years after it came out. He never mentioned having done the film.

So I found the entire production fabulously unexpected. I don’t even know exactly what I expected, but it was not this. It took me a bit of a while to get into it, and my friend said the same went for her, but as soon as we caught on to the premise, we were thrilled with it.

Clue, the play, does incorporate many elements of the ’40s-era game, which provides lots of laughs. It’s basically the board game on steroids. In a great way. It’s all hilarious. (And here’s some good news for you youngsters who unfortunately know nothing of playthings except what’s on your phone or gaming system—this show is just as entertaining even if you’re not familiar with what a board game is!)

I was very impressed with how precise the cast is. The action is incredibly tight and crisp, giving the audience members no time to think about anything that may be going on in our own lives during it. It’s the perfect escape for that brief time. Clue is what every show should be.

I’ll get to the script in a moment, but I have to first laud all the truly amazing, (a word I do not badly about!,) physical humor. Heed my advice here—do not avert your eyes for even one second! I occasionally looked down to write a note for this review, and even if it took just a second or two, I heard the audience roar with laughter and realized I had missed something special. (I’m so used to watching TV, especially during this summer of abundant sports, that I kept thinking I could go back ten seconds and catch what I had failed to see! So I hope to see the show again while the Ahmanson is giving us this wonderful opportunity!)

Clue is an exact example of an ensemble piece, with the actors working together as a highly polished unit. But the stand-outs are the Gumby-esque John Shartzer as Mr. Green and Mark Price as Wadsworth the Butler; those two are perfection. The latter’s late-scene recap of what we have seen until that point is beyond brilliant. (I wish that Heidi Klum would learn how to do it like Mr. Price when she invariably tells us what we have just seen for ourselves after each act on America’s Got Talent!)

I had never seen any of the cast members before, (that I’m aware of, anyway,) and that’s a good thing. I think it helps that there are no famous actors among them, (even though they have many credits among them, including several Broadway productions,) so audiences can see them as solely their characters. Now that we’ve discovered these performers, though, we can look forward to seeing them again.

The script is supremely clever. And it’s a mile a minute. At just seventy-five minutes, Clue is very short, but for once, we wish it was even longer. They pack more bon mots into that hour and a quarter than just about any show I’ve ever seen.

The astute opening night audience seemed to especially enjoy the smattering of political jokes. And Colonel Mustard constantly getting words and actions wrong brought guffaws, including from yours truly.

In addition to all the humor, the visual touches are marvelous. Colonel Mustard holding up the blueprint of the mansion in which the tale is set, and is a bigger replica of the playing board of the game, is an instant theatre classic; that bit garnered big applause the night I saw the show.

I love that my *second favorite childhood game seems to be also adored by so many. (I wish that younger generations could have the experience of board games. But that’s an article for another day.) *[Note: In case you’re curious, my first favorite is another mystery game, but an obscure, very dated even when I was a child, complicated one—Mr. Ree. Do you get the moniker?]

My friend Jeanine was a fan of Clue’s costumes, which brought up one of only two questions I have about the show—why is the cop’s hat all sparkly? (The other is that, near the end, a character mentions that they’re in America, so why do several, if not most, of them have British accents?) But I loved this show so much that neither situation actually bothered me.

One of my theatre pet peeves* is that audiences give standing ovations all the time, even and especially when they are definitely not deserved. Standing Os are supposed to be reserved for when something is special. As soon as Clue began, with the audience going wild as each guest arrived and me not knowing why, I thought, “Oh no—they’re going to do it again.” However, by the time it ended, I was among the first to jump up and give the actors and creative team their due! *[Note: One of my pet peeves, in general, is that exact term itself! So I’m sorry for using it here.]

Opening night was a blast from the get-go. In the welcome address from the theatre’s Artistic Director Snehal Desai, he asked the audience members who had dressed-up as a character from the game to stand-up and be acknowledged. I wish I had known to do that, (the costume part, not the standing-up in the audience part,) because I love dressing-up for a specific occasion like that. What fun to do for an evening or afternoon out! So I suggest you do that when you see the show.

By the way, Clue’s National Tour continues for another nine months, so you INAM readers around the country have the opportunity for this wonderful experience, as well. But if you’re in SoCal, hurry to the Ahmanson! It’s playing here for only a few more weeks!

Clue running through August 25, 2024, 2024
Ahmanson Theatre  135 N. Grand Avenue
213-972-4400 www.centertheatregroup.org