The Ensemble Theatre Company (ETC) presents a new production of Anthony Shaffer‘s Tony Award-Winning play, “Sleuth (1970),” June 9-26.
Directed by Jenny Sullivan, with sets by Fred Kinney, lighting by Jared A. Sayeg, costumes by Dianne K. Graebner, and sound by Randall Robert Tico, “Sleuth” stars Daniel Gerroll and Matthew Floyd Miller, with support from Cornelius Patrick, Doug Ralston and Charles Patrick.
As described by Wikipedia, “The play is set in the Wiltshire manor house of Andrew Wyke, an immensely successful mystery writer. Wyke’s home reflects his obsession with the inventions and deceptions of fiction and his fascination with games and game-playing. He lures his wife’s lover Milo Tindle to the house and convinces him to stage a robbery of her jewelry, a proposal that sets off a chain of events that leaves the audience trying to decipher where Wyke’s imagination ends and reality begins.”
“Sleuth” is nasty good fun, like Harold Pinter on Methedrine, without Pinter’s empathy. To some extent a duel, to a similar extent a stalking — which may well be mutual — it becomes increasingly unclear who is the predator and who the prey, who the tease and who the mark.
Wyke starts out with the moral advantage — Tindle is, after all, an adulterer — but after the moral high ground is claimed and lost a half-dozen times by both men, it’s a toss-up as to who deserves to prevail. As in life, this ambivalence never reaches a wholly convincing resolution.
Anthony Joshua Shaffer (1926-2001) and Sir Peter Levin Shaffer, CBE (1926-2016) were monozygotic twins, who both wrote novels plays and screenplays, and enjoyed enviable success in all three genres.
“Sleuth” is far and away Anthony’s best-known play, but his brother contributed a complete handful of famous plays: “Five Finger Exercise (1958),” “The Royal Hunt of the Sun (1958/1964),” “Equus (1973),” “Amadeus (1979),” and ” Lettice and Lovage (1987).”
Peter’s screenplays were mostly adaptations of his own plays for the screen, but Anthony’s film work includes a brilliant script for Alfred Hitchcock‘s “Frenzy (1972),” the British cult film, “The Wicker Man (1973),” and four very successful adaptations of Agatha Christie‘s Hercule Poirot novels, “Murder on the Orient Express (1974),” “Death on the Nile (1978),” “Evil Under the Sun (1982), and “Appointment with Death (1988).”
Those who rely on twin studies to proclaim the primacy of nature over nurture in the formation of personality or character, might want to place an asterisk beside the Shaffer brothers, for while Anthony was a thrice-married compulsive womanizer, his brother was a homosexual homebody, and though he outlived his life’s partner (New York-based voice teacher Robert Leonard) by some 26 years, the two are buried side-by-side in Highgate Cemetery.
Two messages from the Ensemble:
“’Sleuth’ is made possible through the generosity of ETC’s 2021-22 Season Sponsor Dana White and Production Sponsor Paula Y. Bruice.”
and
“For the health and safety of our audience, ETC strongly suggests that audiences be masked during performances. ETC offers free ticket exchanges or refunds if you are feeling unwell and unable to attend a performance as well as flexible seating in the theater.”
Tickets to “Sleuth” are $25-$40, and may be purchased in person at the New Vic box office, 33 W. Victoria St., by phone at 805-965-5400, email at boxoffice@etcsb.org, or online at https://store.ensembletheatre.com/events.
— Gerald Carpenter covers the arts as a Noozhawk contributing writer. He can be reached at gerald.carpenter@gmail.com. The opinions expressed are his own.