Year: 1985
Title of the play: The Real Inspector Hound
Author: Tom Stoppard
Director: Tom Stoppard
Others in the Cast: Ian McKellen, Roy Kinnear, Claire Moore, Jonathan Hyde, Eleanor Bron, Selina Cadell, Stephen Macdonald, Greg Hicks
Company/Event: National Theatre Company Ian McKellen-Edward Petherbridge Group
Theatre and location: Olivier Theatre, London
Other productions of the same play: 1986 - Odéon-Théâtre de l’Europe, Paris
International Theatre Festival, Blackstone Theatre, Chicago.
Plot summary: The plot follows two theatre critics named Moon and Birdboot who are watching a ludicrous setup of a country house murder mystery, in the style of a whodunit. By chance, they become involved in the action causing a series of events that parallel the play they are watching.
Peth’s role: Moon
Reviews:
Hound is a schoolboy-clever send-up of Agatha Christie's The Mousetrap, with all its clunking contrivances, coupled with the petulant fantasies of a second-string critic (Petherbridge) about an uprising by all the world's also-rans. - William A Henry III, Time.
Production details: Here
Related links:
A discussion on the McKellen-Petherbridge Company’s choice of director for this play:
The challenge is compounded by their choice of directors for forthcoming plays. For a double bill of Tom Stoppard's ''The Real Inspector Hound'' and Sheridan's ''The Critic,'' the two had the boldness to name Mr. Stoppard, who has seldom directed, and Sheila Hancock, an actress-director with the company, and, according to Mr. McKellen, only the second woman ever to direct at the National. The fourth director, also an outsider, Mike Alfreds, has been signed to stage an intimate ''Cherry Orchard'' in the small Cottesloe Theater. The announced intention of the company is that the individual directors' ''versatility and experience will make exceptional demands'' on the actors, and the actors, in reciprocity, will be able to influence the directors. Mel Gussow, New York Times, August 18, 1985
Gallery:
