Willing Accomplice

by Robert von Stein Redick

Obsession may be a dangerous condition, but in the theater danger sometimes pays off handsomely. Such is the case with Accomplice, Rupert Holmes's hilarious and (prepare yourself) postmodern whodunnit, in which the unifying obsession is the genre itself -- the Agatha Christie-style "thriller" that persuades us to fiddle with the plot like a Rubik's Cube to the very end. Like The Crying Game (which it in no other way resembles), Accomplice contains secrets that a reviewer cannot hint at without risking harm. But the standard whodunnit trappings won't surprise anyone: poisons, microphones, chases on tiptoe. Of course you know this all takes place in a dark, creaky kind of place -- an English moorland cottage, as it happens, replete with antlers and blackened beams. You know the business partner (played by Walter Hudson) and the wife (Stephanie Zimbalist) hate the naive executive husband (Richard Kind). You know the husband's naiveté isn't as deep as they think. You know . . .

Well, plenty. And while nothing in this bag of props could easily reduce your reviewer to tears of mirth, this Ogunquit Playhouse production did so. The reason is simple: Holmes' wit turns on itself. We laugh not at the poor bungling murderers so much as at our own absurd appetites for absurdity. When a figure (who must remain nameless) cries, "What England do these people come from?" he is not indicting the play -- the accents are precisely as bad as necessary -- but rather America's distorting fascination with wealthy Britain, its affected exterior and gothic underclothes. And when the murder-plots multiply out of all proportion, the fine acting ensemble gets us giggling at our own silly need to see it all resolved with death's solid thump. Habeus corpus? You betcha, seven times over.

Accomplice runs through July 15 at the Ogunquit Playhouse. Call 207-646-5511.