NEW WHODUNNIT WANTS YOU TO TAKE A STAB AT SLEUTHING
Sometimes an actor needs to do some gruesome research to portray a convincing stage death.
Jon Martin, who plays the victim Barrett in Postmedia theatre critic and playwright Louis B. Hobson’s new whodunnit Happy Death Day, had an expert at hand to assist him when it came time to die on stage. Gino Savoia, one of his fellow cast members, is a paramedic by day.
“He was actually able to give me notes a couple days ago on what it actually looks like. I can tell you how he’s killed because it’s the first thing you see in the show, he gets stabbed to death,” Martin said.
“He was actually able to tell me how stabbing victims react to being stabbed to death. He was able to remind me and walk me through, anatomically speaking, what would actually be happening to that person and that person’s body.”
It’s macabre, but it’s all in the name of entertaining theatre.
“Last night’s version of the death scene in rehearsal was fairly different from what it was beforehand,” Martin said. “One of the actors on the stage at the moment was actually telling me that it was kind of fun watching me die.”
Your reaction to Barrett’s death may vary. Though Martin describes him as manipulative, he also hopes he has given the character more depth.
“We tried to bring him more into the realm of not just a cold, unfeeling sociopath,” he said. “You almost feel sorry for him in the end.”
In the play produced by Confederation Theatre Society, Barrett is
celebrating his 21st birthday and the inheritance of his father’s fortune, despite being the youngest child, when he meets his untimely demise. Suspects include the two older children passed over in the will, but also all of the other characters still living after the initial scene.
“(Hobson)’s dropped a lot of red herrings throughout the script," Martin said.
“If you’re paying enough attention, there are moments from every single character where you’re sitting there going, ‘Wait a minute, he just said this and that. It might be him.’”
That’ll make for added entertainment when audience members get a chance to talk back at special performances on Nov. 23 and 24.
After the show on those nights, the audience will be able to explain who they thought did it and why. Stay behind sleuths will be rewarded with a slice of Barrett’s birthday cake.
“We’re excited to see what people guess, where people’s minds go,” said Martin.
“Hopefully the guesses are all over the place. That’s what Louis is trying to shoot for, I think.”