Like any volunteer group, the Opal Bay Amateur Theatre Society (OBATS) has its fair share of problems in this light-hearted take on the traditional whodunit. As if personality clashes, love affairs gone wrong, financial shenanigans and a looming opening night weren't enough, now one of their members has turned up murdered! Surely it wasn't one of the theatre's own members who did it... Or was it???
Keywords: murder mystery, cozy mystery, seniors, volunteers, humour, comedy, light-hearted, romance, relationships
Produced by Ladysmith Little Theatre, Ladysmith BC, 2025
Genre: Mystery
Acts: 2
Run time: 90 minutes
Suitable for students 14+
Content notes: The swearing in this play has been deliberately bowdlerized. For example, character use F-words such as Fudge, Futzing, and so on, because the playwright finds obscenities boring.
Cast size: 9 actors
Male roles: 4
Female roles: 4
Other roles: 1
Casting notes: All but one of the characters in UnRehearsed Murder are on the high side of 50+ years. The ingenue, Darlene, is 16 - 23(ish) years old. Officer Javill, the police-person, could be female or male.
Actors could be of any race, ethnicity, background and for that matter, any age, since wigs and makeup can do wonders.
"...this cozy whodunit playfully blurs the line between art and life."
-- Morgan Brayton, Ladysmith-Chemainus Chronicle