The Mousetrap

Produced at the Piccadilly Theatre, London, on 31st March 1945, with the following cast of characters:

(in the order of their appearance)

 

MRS. BOYNTON

Mary Clare

 

 

GINEVRA BOYNTON, her stepdaughter

Deryn Kerbey

 

 

LENNOX BOYNTON, her elder stepson

Ian Lubbock

 

 

NADINE BOYNTON, Lennox’s wife

Beryl Machin

 

 

LIFT BOY

John Glennon

 

 

ALDERMAN HIGGS

Percy Walsh

 

 

Anthony Dorset

 

 

LADY WESTHOLME

Janet Burnell

 

 

MISS PRYCE

Joan Hickson

 

 

DR. GERARD

Gerard Hinze

 

 

SARAH KING

Carla Lehmann

 

 

JEFFERSON COPE

Alan Sedgwick

 

 

RAYMOND BOYNTON,

 

 

    Lennox’s younger brother

John Wynn

 

 

DRAGOMAN

Harold Berens

 

 

COLONEL CARBERY

Owen Reynolds

 

 

LADY VISITOR

Cherry Herbert

 

 

HOTEL VISITORS

 

The play directed by Terence de Marney

 

SYNOPSIS OF SCENES

ACT I

The lounge of the King Solomon Hotel, Jerusalem. Afternoon

ACT II

SCENE1   The Travellers’ Camp at Petra. Early afternoon. A week later

SCENE2   The same. Three hours later

ACT III

SCENE1   The same. The following morning

SCENE2   The same. The same afternoon

Time: the present

 

AUTHOR’S NOTE

The effect of the lift ascending and descending can be easily obtained by having a gauze window in the lift door, behind which is a shutter which can be raised as the lift descends and lowered as the lift ascends. There should be a domed light which is always alight, suspended in the lift in sight of the audience.

Characters should wear semitropical clothes suitable to character and nationality. It will be found effective if all characters wear costume light in colour, except MRS. BOYNTON, who should dress throughout in unrelieved black. The Hotel CLERK wears a grey frock coat and tarboosh. The DRAGOMAN wears a white Arab dress and red tarboosh in the hotel, but changes into brown garments for the camp scenes, as also does the ARAB BOY. COLONEL CARBERY wears the khaki uniform of the Palestine Police, i.e. tunic and shorts with a blue service peaked cap.

ACT ONE

SCENE: The lounge of the King Solomon Hotel, Jerusalem. Afternoon.

Back Centre are three open arches, the centre one giving access to a terrace with a balcony rail with a wide expanse of blue sky beyond. An arch up Right leads to the main entrance, and arches down Right and up Left lead to other parts of the hotel. There is a lift behind a sliding door down Left. A quadrant counter for the reception clerk is up Left. A small table stands Centre with five chairs around it. There is a low table with a chair above it, down Right. Other small tables are set against the walls. On the terrace there are two chairs and a table with a sunshade.