The Business of Murder
by Richard Harris
Directed by Paula Bate
Season: 31st May - 2nd August 1997The Business of Murder is written by Richard Harris, who is best known for Stepping Out a play centred around a tap dancing class. Surprisingly, Harris is a noted writer of thrillers for stage and television. He considers The Business of Murder to be his best. Set in England in the nineteen-eighties, it is a tale of revenge, but no ordinary revenge.
You are a policeman, and a distraught father summons you to a meeting with his son who has become involved in the drug trade and now wishes to inform. Except there is no son.
You are a television writer, and you receive a letter from a woman accompanying a play she has written for television. It is not very good, however, her husband 'phones and begs you see his wife and give her some encouragment. She is terminally ill with only a few months to live. You agree. You go to their flat. Except there is no wife.
Suddenly you are plunged into a nightmare - the business of murder.
Who is this man? What is his motive? How will it end?
Harris' play is a real thriller, the best to be written in years, with more twists than a corkscrew. A step back to the classic days of Hitchcock. Tense, taut, terrific.
Cast: Allan Scully, Tony Girdler, Jenni Lynch