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INSPECTOR. (Into the telephone) Get me the police station, will you?

(HENRIETTA starts to sob as—the Curtain falls.)

CURTAIN

The Mousetrap

Presented by Peter Saunders at the Ambassadors Theatre, London, on 25th November 1952, with the following cast of characters:

(in the order of their appearance)

MOLLIE RALSTON

Sheila Sim

GILES RALSTON

John Paul

CHRISTOPHER WREN

Allan McClelland

MRS. BOYLE

Mignon O’Doherty

MAJOR METCALF

Aubrey Dexter

MISS CASEWELL

Jessica Spencer

MR. PARAVICINI

Martin Miller

DETECTIVE SERGEANT TROTTER

Richard Attenborough

The play produced by Peter Cotes

Décor by Roger Furse

SYNOPSIS OF SCENES

ACT I

SCENE1   The Great Hall at Monkswell Manor. Late afternoon

SCENE2   The same. The following day after lunch

ACT II

The same. Ten minutes later

Time: the present

ACT ONE

Scene I

SCENE: The Great Hall at Monkswell Manor. Late afternoon.

The house looks not so much a period piece but a house which has been lived in by generations of the same family with dwindling resources. There are tall windows up Centre; a big arched opening up Right leading to the entrance hall, the front door and the kitchen; and an arched opening Left leading upstairs to the bedrooms. Up Left leading off the stairs is the door to the library; down Left is the door to the drawing room; and down Right the door (opening on stage) to the dining room. Right is an open fireplace, and beneath the window up Centre a windowseat and a radiator.

The hall is furnished as a lounge. There is some good old oak, including a large refectory table by the window up Centre, an oak chest in the entrance hall up Right, and a stool on the stairs Left. The curtains and the upholstered furniture—a sofa Left Centre, an armchair Centre, a large leather armchair Right, and a small Victorian armchair down Right—are shabby and old-fashioned. There is a combined desk and bookcase Left, with a radio and telephone on it and a chair beside it. There is another chair up Right Centre by the window, a Canterbury containing newspapers and magazines above the fireplace and a small half-circular card table behind the sofa. There are two wall brackets over the fireplace which are worked together; and a wall bracket on the Left wall, one Left of the library door and one in the entrance hall, which are also worked together. There are double switches Left of the arch up Right, and on the downstage side of the door down Left, and a single switch on the upstage side of the door down Right. A table lamp stands on the sofa table.

Before Curtain rises the House LIGHTS fade to a complete blackout and the music of “Three Blind Mice” is heard.