Some of the ingredients and prepatation…..

We were very privileged to have the Lord Effingham able to join us for the night. Unfortunately, Lady Effingham was unable to join us, on account of her being in the middle of divorce proceedings.

This was, of course, the beginning of the Murder Mystery Evening, one of the reasons for our trip (like you need an excuse to goto Langebaan). We bought the game from www.host-party.com, and it was a fantastic evening. I quote from the script:

Good evening everyone and welcome to Effingham Hall, the new home of rock legend, Roland Stone. Tonight’s party was to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the formation of the supergroup ‘The Falling Rocks’ which was founded by Roland Stone and Tristan Shout. I am afraid however that I have some terrible news about Roland. You all saw Roland jumping around in his hot tub when the lights were turned on and then lying very still. Well I am afraid that he was not fooling around. He had been electrocuted and he is dead. Roland bought this place six months ago and his hot tub was the centerpiece of the extensive alterations, which he had done to this beautiful 15th Century mansion. The police have been called and will be undertaking their investigation.

The characters were:

Glad Allover (Rock Chick), played by Jenny. She is Roland’s girlfriend for the past five years. A lively girl who has hung round the fringes of rock music for years.

Tristan Shout (Guitarist), played by Rory, our Sushi chef. He is the guitarist with Roland’s group The Falling Rocks. Has a habit of slipping lines from songs into his conversation. (He also has a big, six string bass guitar that is bigger than him!)

Ophelia Bottom (Actress), or bottome, as Lois called herself. She is a Shakespearean actress who owns her own theatre called "The Ophelia" She loves to talk in rhyming couplets (or Iambic pentameter if you are cultured!) as if she was still on stage.

Orson Cart (Film Director), played by myself. I am the director of the new motion picture about Roland’s life. Previously I have directed some of the all time great movies.

Ann Thology (Author), played by Lynne. She is the writer of Roland’s new biography, Rock’n'Roland. She has written a number of crime thrillers and murder mysteries.

Adam Upp (Account), played by Mark. He is Roland’s accountant and financial advisor. He has control of Roland’s financial affairs and tries to keep Roland’s spending in check.

Wendy Legsache (Fitness Trainer), played by Chantal. She is Roland’s personal fitness trainer. She has been seen regularly around Effingham Hall during her daily sessions with Roland as he has fought to stay fit and youthful.

Al Legations (Lawyer), played by Paul. He is Roland’s legal advisor. He has had his hands full with Roland’s many business deals and property transactions and is one of his most respected advisors.

Lord Effingham (English Lord), played by Nick. He is the Previous owner of Effingham Hall who had sold it to Roland after it had been in his family for 300 years

I found to remarkable how quickly we all slid into our roles and played our parts. While we managed to stick very closely to the story, we definitely had a large amount of ad-libbing and extra subplots emerging that were definitely not in the script. This could be due to the six bottles of bobbly that Effingham brought with him.

  Of course, all of this acting is hard work, so we needed plenty of time to relax and chill. Its so easy to do that at Langebaan.

 
All in all, it was a great weekend, and we will be planning our next murder mystery evening very soon.