Take a very deep breath, prepare to be thrilled and settle in for a classic, and suitably chilling, whodunit.
Dead Simple comes to Cambridge Arts Theatre on the back of the success of 2014 production The Perfect Murder, starring Les Dennis (read our review online at cambridge-news.co.uk/whatson). The same team has got together to stage the theatre premiere of the bestselling thriller from prolific detective writer Peter James.
The 2005 crime novel, the first in a series of 11 books and counting based on the expert sleuthing of Brighton-based Detective Superintendent Roy Grace, sees the very contented Michael Harrison (he’s got the job, the friends and the fiancée everyone envies), buried alive after a prank on his stag night goes dangerously awry. As his world shrinks to the size of a coffin stuck under six feet of suffocating earth, DS Roy Grace tries to work out where he is. Will he run out of time though?
Admittedly, if you’re in any way claustrophobic it’s probably not the show for you. However, James was kind enough to write the script, so hardcore nit-picking fans can’t complain quite so much if there are any additional twists not originally in the book, and it’s been directed by the Olivier award winning Ian Talbot.
It’s also starring a gaggle of telly box soap actors including the glossily haired Tina Hobley (Holby City, Coronation Street, Harbour Lights), chiselled Hollyoaks bad boy Jamie Lomas and Scottish actor Gray O’Brien (award-winning star of Coronation Street, Peak Practice, Casualty) will play the inimitable Grace.