Would you be willing to kill to write next season's hit? A play about writing plays has got to be boring right? 

Not at all if the play is Ira Levin’s thriller Deathtrap, which Hatrix Theatre puts on Oct. 14-17 at the Moose Hall.
 It is about a renown but struggling playwright Sidney Bruhl who is living on his wife Myra’s money and his protégé Clifford Anderson who has a new idea Sidney is willing to kill for.


“It’s a murder mystery with some comedic elements,” explained director Karolyn Harker.
 

It has the feel of a great thriller, with everything happening in one room and five characters.


“It’s about a playwright who has been dry for the past 18 years when he hasn’t had a hit. Then suddenly he has an idea one of his students has submitted at one of his seminars. So he plots to steal the play and put his name on it. So he can be a success again,” she continued.


“However the only way to do that is to get rid of the young playwright,” she added.
As the title of the play, Deathtrap, suggests, there is a lot of bloodshed in pursuit of this goal as the title of the play being written is eerily reminiscent of earlier events which intrigues two other characters later in the play.


The play features a talented and experienced cast including Stephen Graham, Preston Scholz, Marcie Stork, Sheila Matson and Richard Amery.


“There are thunderstorms, gunshots, lightning, suspense and some pretty funny moments,” Harker said.


“Our cast is fabulously gifted and ready to show Lethbridge a really good time,” she enthused.
Hatrix veteran Preston Scholz is excited to play the young playwright Clifford Anderson.


“I think he starts off a little naïve about everything, but he is excited to learn from the master,” Scholz said.


“And he quickly discovers the business is not all it’s cracked up to be,” he continued.


“I always want to be involved in Hatrix productions especially when we have Karolyn directing,” Scholz said.
“It’s a fun night out,” he continued.
 

The cast has been hard at work for the past eight weeks learning a lot of lines and wrapping their minds around the intricate plotting of Deathtrap.


“Hatrix usually does rich comedies, so we’re excited to do something different,” Scholz said.


Stephen Graham is excited to be  Sidney Bruhl  “a moderately successful playwright looking for his next great idea.
“He’s resting on his laurels,” Graham said adding he loved Deathtrap as soon as he read  the script.


“As I read the play, I laughed and I kept turning pages to get to the end. It was such an interesting story,” he said, adding he has enjoyed the rehearsal process.
 

“I’ve enjoyed watching the finished play coming to life. I see the sparks catching fire,” he said.


“If you don’t come and see the play, you won’t know who done it,” he said.
“There's so many twists and turns and it's such an intricate play that nobody could describe it without seeing it. You have to see it to believe it,” he added.


Sheila Matson gets to play the more blatant comedic character- the Dutch psychic Helga Ten Dorp whose predictions come eerily close to the truth.


“It’s a challenging role. I played an Italian last time, so I seem to be getting European roles,” Matson said.


“I see death,” Matson said of her character, who speaks in an accent for her second straight Hatrix production. She played an Italian in Lend Me A Tenor last October.

She was also in Hatrix Theatre’s production of the Foreigner in 2013.


“Learning the accent has been a real bitch because it is Dutch. It’s also difficult going in and out  of a trance,” she said learning those qualities has been a lot of fun.


“She frightens people at the time as she’s a seer. With Myra (Sidney’s long suffering wife, played by Marcie Stork) she sees a potential tragedy,” she continued.


“She's a real psychic, it’s not booga booga. That’s not what she’s about,” she continued.


“It’s ready for an audiences. Ira Levin is a master. He wrote Rosemary’s Baby. So there’s lots of twists and turns,” Matson said.
 The play is one of five Ira Levin plays that were made into movies.


Tickets cost $15 in advance from Blueprint and $20 at the door. There are only 70 seats available for each performance, which begins at 8 p.m. each night, Oct. 14-17.