J’ACCUSE!!! Someone in this show is a murderer. Can you spot them? But how can you, when the cast of Murder, She Didn’t Write is making it all up on the spot?! Fringe goers are in for a wild night of laughs as the show’s cast improvise a marvellous, and often-times mad, murder mystery based on audience suggestions. Following Detective Hugh Dunnit and his assistant Jerkins (also an audience member), audiences are asked to select a setting, an item, and something that would be rather curious about this item. The show on Friday March 6 followed “The Case of the Blue Banana”, set during a tour of the under sewers of Adelaide (AKA the Tour Down Under).

The cast of Penelope, Vernon, Gerald, Meryl, and Marigold, each with a tantalising role to play (and a… more than curious motive…), come together for an International Women’s Slay during an International Women’s Day brunch. The quintet discover the rare blue banana in the underbelly of the Adelaide sewers. But not all is peaceful in fate and fruit. Sewer inspector Marigold is found completely juiced in the sewer rec room, alongside a bottle of Malibu, a puddle of empty banana peels, and a completely dry roll of toilet paper with a photo of Frida Kahlo stuffed inside. But who was the murderer? And what was their motive? Could it be the twin sister with weak wrists? Perhaps it was the photographer with a questionable fetish? Maybe it was the jilted lover who loved the sewers more than anything? Or was it the childhood friend with “sh*t t*ts”?

The performers of the show themselves are true champions of improv, standing as role models for what it means to be not just good, not just great, but amazing at acting. Whether they’re testing each other’s ability to make rhyming songs or name famous women of the 1930s, the cast’s attempts at breaking each other’s improv show a deep admiration for one another, one that audiences are sure to pick up on. The concept of the show itself places Detective Hugh Dunnit in the spotlight (quite literally at times), forcing them to piece together the evidence as it unfolds on stage. The show is a masterclass in how to be successful at the Fringe. 

With a different case to solve every night, I very well might return to see what other whacky and wild shenanigans ensue. Perhaps Dr Green will be swallowed by a blue whale in the middle of the Sahara desert. Or perchance, Professor Violet will be impaled by a penguin in the middle of Time Square. Or maybe Ms Blue will drink an explosive frozen margarita at the Adelaide Fringe! Find out what the next case is and get your tickets to Murder, She Didn’t Write NOW!!