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As theaters try to coax back audiences, thrillers are having a sudden, surprising renaissance in Chicago theater.
Drury Lane Theatre staged Agatha Christie’s “And Then There Were None” this summer. Raven Theatre produced “Night Watch,” a mostly forgotten psychological mystery from the 1970s, and now Georgette Verdin, the talented director at Raven, has moved over to Northlight Theatre with a progressive new spin on “Dial M For Murder,” a 1952 Frederick Knott play that became a 1954 Alfred Hitchcock movie (starring Grace Kelly and Ray Milland) that then was re-adapted last year for the stage by Jeffrey Hatcher.
Although it retains its London location and period style, Hatcher’s version turned what had been a heterosexual love triangle, fueled by jealousy and greed, into the story of a wealthy married woman who is anxious to conceal her lesbian affair with a crime writer from her dangerous husband. Hubby is no longer a flaccid but handsome tennis pro, enjoying a life above his station, but a failed writer turned cynical publicist whose clients include the very smart and superior woman who now is deeply involved with his own wife.
Hatcher, of course, is a skilled, commercially savvy writer who clearly knew his assignment here was to retain and re-up the box-office pull of one of the best titles of the mid-20th century while also appealing to modern-day theater people who want to put butts in seats without being seen to surrender to the values of the mid-1950s, heaven forfend. Ergo, the new “Dial M for Murder,” which had its premiere last year at the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego and now focuses on women outsmarting men who are all too willing to let their own sexist prejudices lead them away from the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Even the famous Inspector Hubbard, now alas subservient to his own patriarchal tendencies.
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Not all estates would want a play written in 1952 to be updated like this, and some will miss Knott’s original, but there’s no question that Hatcher breathes some fresh life into the piece, and Verdin’s fast-paced and verbose production benefits from a sizzling little cast of Nick Sandys (whose carefully self-protected detective beautifully fits the new gestalt), Ryan Hallahan (who knows his role is to dispense superficial charm), Felipe Carrasco and, as the classy leading players, Elizabeth Laidlaw and Lucy Carapetyan. This is a deep dive in particular from Carapetyan, and some of the most revealing work I’ve seen this long-standing Chicago actress do. That’s especially notable because you don’t expect that in genre shows like this one — clearly, Verdin and Carapetyan decided that they wanted to treat this character as a serious and emotionally complex woman, trying to forge a very complicated escape and stay alive at the same time. Good for them.
“Dial M” always was a carefully plotted thriller, of course, which is what attracted Hitchcock to it in the first place. Hatcher is sufficient good at his craft to keep everything tight and avoid obvious anachronisms. I’ve seen “Dial M” several times before and know the plot pretty well, and yet the new revisions kept me on my toes.
Theater Loop
Chris Jones is a Tribune critic.
Review: “Dial M for Murder” (3 stars)
When: Through Jan. 7, 2024
Where: Northlight Theatre at the North Shore Center for the Arts, 9501 Skokie Blvd., Skokie
Running time: 2 hours, 10 minutes
Tickets: $49-$89 at 847-673-6300 and northlight.org