Pen, Paint, and Pretzel's minor production of The Real Inspector Hound turns the tables on traditional drama by putting the actors in the audience and the critics on the stage while utilizing a mysteriously complex play-within-a-play structure. The play, which will be performed tonight in the Balch Arena Theater, centers on a whodunit murder mystery but offers an underlying commentary on the state of theater as an art form and the relationship between drama and life.
Hound was written by Tom Stoppard, who many in the cast - including director Megan Kiefer - describe as "a theatrical genius." Kiefer offers this as one of her major reasons for choosing to direct the play, also citing the challenges it poses for both directors and actors.
"It's a complicated play to pull off," said the junior and International Relations major, "because there are so many ways to interpret it."
The show's stage manager, senior Amanda Berkowitz, says that Hound has surprising depth for a short play: "There are so many levels to both real life and the life of the show, and there's not really anywhere in between," she said. "It's up to the audience to decide where everything fits in."
But several things happen before the audience can even begin to figure out what is happening on the stage. The play opens with a dialogue between two theater critics, Birdboot (sophomore Josh Bauml) and Moon (sophomore Sam Rivers) that sets the scene for what becomes an engaging comedy involving situations that are not necessarily funny on their own account but come across as ingenious once combined.
"Just when you think you know what's going on everything gets flipped around," Rivers said. "Everything is fair game."
Many of the characters and events are over-dramatized because Kiefer saw that as the best way to integrate the play's relationship between theater and life. Thus, in the stereotypical murder-mystery sense, much of the action involves what Kiefer described as "popping heads."
Senior Melissa Holman, who plays the stern servant Mrs. Drugde, consistently makes references within the play to the presence of a mysterious fog lifting outside of the mansion where the action takes place. This alone helps the audience to visualize the eerie setting.
"It's really important to pay attention to everything that's happening on the stage," said junior Emily Jerez, who plays the sultry and rich Cynthia. "People have a tendency to zone out when seeing a play, but there are just so many substories here."
Aside from the relation between the theater critics and the actual play, there are a few conflicting romantic relationships - one of which is based on a mistaken changed identity. Then there are several times when one or more of the cast members expresses a desire to kill the character Simon Gascoyne (freshman Brett Weiner). When he actually does die, the play takes an entirely new direction.
And, of course, there still remains the question of who really is Inspector Hound. Is he the police officer played by freshman Andrew Churella? Or is he someone entirely different; someone we don't meet until the play's end?
Churella offers his own interpretation. "I guess it makes more sense if I am the real Inspector Hound," he said. "The part is kind of weird - I come in from nowhere, and it's kind of unclear why I'm there...he's not the greatest example of law enforcement."
But regardless of which way you look at it, Hound still embodies what Birdboot describes in the script as one of the most important ingredients for successful drama: "It has a beginning, a middle, and I have no doubt that it will prove to have an end."
3P's production of 'The Real Inspector Hound' will be performed tonight in the Balch Arena Theater at 7 pm with a repeat performance at 9:30. Admission is free.
