Sleuth by Anthony Shaffer

First published: 1970

First produced: 1970, at St. Martin’s Theatre, London

Type of plot: Mystery and detective

Time of work: The 1970’s

Locale: England

Principal Characters:

• Andrew Wyke, a successful mystery author
• Milo Tindle, a travel agent and the lover of Andrew’s wife
• Inspector Doppler, a police detective

The Play

Sleuth is presented in two acts, with all the action taking place in the country-home interior of famous mystery writer Andrew Wyke. It is a summer evening; a solitary Andrew is absorbed in finishing his latest manuscript featuring his famous fictional creation, the eccentric and brilliant amateur sleuth, St. John Lord Merridew. Andrew, middle-aged and dressed casually in his smoking jacket, is obviously pleased with his latest work and begins to recite it aloud as he strolls around his living room decorated with a variety of games, puzzles, and toys.

The doorbell rings and Andrew invites Milo Tindle in. Milo is a young, handsome travel agent whom Andrew has invited over this evening to discuss Milo’s involvement with Andrew’s wife, Marguerite. Milo is at first taken aback by Andrew’s civil openness about the situation, but Andrew insists that he has no animosity against Milo, that he only wants to make sure Milo knows what he is getting into. Andrew claims he does not love Marguerite and is perfectly willing to divorce her so he can more fully enjoy his mistress, Teya. He wants to make sure, however, that Milo can take care of Marguerite in the comfort and luxury to which she is accustomed in order to prevent her from becoming dissatisfied with Milo in a few months and trying to reconcile with Andrew. Milo admits that his travel agency business, although successful, is still somewhat financially insecure.

Andrew, smug and aggressive, filled with devilish energy and cunning, proposes a scheme to Milo in an effort to keep Marguerite happy and lavishly content and therefore permanently out of Andrew’s life. Andrew suggests that Milo rob the estate of some valuable jewelry along with the receipts, and sell the jewels on the black market, enabling Milo to garner a sizable amount of cash and giving Andrew the opportunity to collect on the insurance. Andrew then outlines an elaborate burglary plan involving Milo breaking into the home, ransacking various rooms and ultimately taking the gems.

Milo is quite suspicious at first. He cannot believe Andrew would be so obliging in his efforts to free himself of Marguerite. Andrew insists, however, that his motives are free from malice and the scheme is foolproof. Finally, to Andrew’s delight, Milo agrees to the plan. Andrew insists that Milo disguise himself using one of Andrew’s old theatrical costumes and break into the estate through an upstairs window. Milo begins to catch Andrew’s enthusiastic, flamboyant fever and ends up dressing like a clown. He follows Andrew’s orders and while he is busy breaking into the home, Andrew rigs the safe containing the jewels with explosives and blows it open. Both men then indulge in a frenzied ransacking of the home, throwing papers, overturning furniture, disemboweling drawers and closets, until the house is in sufficient disarray.

Andrew then announces that they must make it appear as if Andrew walked in on the crime and that Milo subdued Andrew before escaping with the jewels. First Andrew proposes that Milo strike him so it will appear as if the two had struggled. Then Andrew produces a gun, however, and says that the plan should be that Andrew at first held the gun on Milo but after a struggle in which shots were fired, Milo escaped. Andrew then fires two shots from the gun, breaking various objects in the living room. Then he turns to Milo and says that he is going to kill him. Milo thinks that Andrew is joking. Andrew then reveals the real reason for inviting Milo over for the evening. Andrew is outraged that a young, unaristocratic upstart could even contemplate running off with the wife of a respected nobleman. Andrew has set up the mock crime in order to make it appear as if he merely shot an anonymous burglar instead of his wife’s lover. He then tells Milo to put on his clown mask and prepare to die. Milo pleads for his life but to no avail. Andrew puts the gun to Milo’s head and shoots him. The curtain falls, ending act 1.

Act 2 begins two days later. Andrew, alone again, is preparing a small supper for himself when the doorbell brings. It is Detective Inspector Doppler of the local county constabulary investigating the disappearance of Milo. Andrew insists that he knows nothing about Milo’s disappearance until Doppler produces a note written two days ago by Andrew inviting Milo over for the evening. Doppler says the note was found in Milo’s cottage. Andrew then admits to having Milo visit him two nights ago but states that Milo had left later in the evening. Doppler mentions that reports of gunshots coming from Andrew’s home had been made by a neighbor passing by that evening. Doppler also mentions that, after talking to other neighbors, he learned that Milo and Andrew’s wife were having an affair.

Andrew, visibly agitated, begins to relate the events of Milo’s visit. He tells Doppler of the elaborate burglary scheme, of Milo agreeing to the plan, dressing up like a clown, and breaking into the home. Andrew also explains how he shot Milo. He then confesses that the real purpose of the scheme was to invite Milo over and humiliate him, to teach him a lesson for trying to run off with Andrew’s wife. Andrew insists that he shot Milo with a blank and that Milo, after recovering from the shock, left for the evening. Doppler is horrified at Andrew’s callousness, unnerved that anyone could go to such elaborate and sadistic extremes to humiliate a person. He also does not believe that Milo left the house alive. Andrew insists that it was merely a game to teach Milo a lesson. Doppler suggests that it might have started out as a game but that it had ended up as murder.

Doppler begins to investigate the premises. At first, Andrew is amused by Doppler’s plodding techniques but then becomes horrified when Doppler finds fresh bloodstains on the carpet and clothes hidden in a closet with Milo’s name sewn into the lining. Andrew is dumbfounded and cannot explain how the bloodstains or the clothes got there. Doppler then announces that Andrew is under arrest for murder. Andrew shrieks and attempts to evade Doppler. As they scuffle, Doppler suddenly reveals to Andrew that he, Detective Inspector Doppler, is actually Milo in disguise.

After the shock of the revelation wears off and Andrew grudgingly congratulates Milo on his clever masquerade, Milo also confesses his admiration for Andrew’s bogus crime. Milo also states that he feels his own game has hardly settled the score. Milo is still shaken by Andrew’s mock murder and announces that, unlike Andrew, he has committed a real murder. He tells Andrew that while he had been planting the fake evidence for his own game the previous day when Andrew had been away, Andrew’s mistress, Teya, had shown up, and that after seducing her, Milo killed her. Andrew does not believe him and calls Teya, only to learn from Teya’s roommate that Teya has indeed been murdered. Milo then tells Andrew that he has informed the police, who are on their way at the moment. Milo also tells Andrew that he has left incriminating evidence around the living room that will implicate Andrew as the murderer. Milo then gives clues to Andrew to help him find the evidence so he can destroy it before the police arrive.

Andrew becomes frantic as he begins tearing around the living room, looking for the evidence. With Milo’s cryptic clues, he is able to find all the evidence only moments before the police arrive. It turns out, however, that the police are merely voices coming from the doorway, impersonated by Milo. Milo then tells Andrew that Teya is alive and that she had enthusiastically agreed to help Milo fake her murder by lending him some of her personal items as the phony evidence. Milo also tells Andrew that Teya is not really his mistress because Andrew is impotent. Milo then reconfirms his plans to run off with Marguerite and goes to collect some of Marguerite’s belongings.

Andrew sits, slumped and defeated. As Milo rummages through Marguerite’s room, Andrew retrieves his gun and begins plotting a new scheme. When Milo returns, Andrew announces that if Milo tries to leave, Andrew will shoot him as a burglar, and this time he will use real bullets. Milo laughs and says that he would not be able to get away with the murder because Milo did in fact tell the police all about Andrew’s mock crime and that if Andrew were to shoot him now, the police would not believe the burglary story. Andrew, dismissing Milo’s news as just another charade, shoots Milo. As Milo slumps to the floor, the sound of an approaching car is heard and a flashing police car light shines through the window. Andrew screams in anguish as the curtain falls, ending the play.

Dramatic Devices

The two acts of Sleuth are presented to illustrate the contrast as well as the interrelationships that exist between the world of detective fact and detective fiction. In act 1, Andrew is clearly in control of the proceedings as he manipulates Milo into first believing he is helping to assure his successful future with Marguerite by playing Andrew’s games, and then into believing that Andrew has actually shot him dead.

In act 2, it is the plodding and methodical Inspector Doppler and his world of detective fact that manipulates Andrew. In this world, Andrew’s flamboyance, his gift for mimicry and his allusions to his literary heroes, so charming and appropriate in act 1, now fail to impress the serious Doppler. Even the canned laughter from one of Andrew’s most innocent props, a life-size doll dressed as a sea captain, sounds hollow and ironic in Doppler’s presence.

Milo avenges himself in act 2 by using all the tricks Andrew used to humiliate him in act 1: disguises, deceit, horrible puns, literary allusions, and a chilling disregard for human life. Throughout both acts, the setting remains the same, the traditional country estate interior, as if it were a huge game board itself, unchanging except for its human game pieces. The two characters, with their theatrical disguises and repertoire of voices, create the illusion of a houseful of eccentric caricatures, all of whom would be found in the traditional drawing room whodunit: maids and butlers, police detectives, tantalizing mistresses, frivolous wives, and the infallible amateur supersleuth.

Probably the most effective device used to illustrate the ironic relationship that exists between flesh and blood, fact and fiction, is the staging of Milo’s two deaths. Milo’s first “death” is the more shocking and unsettling of the two. It is set up so the audience believes right along with Milo that he has been shot in the head and killed. Milo’s second death, although now in deadly earnest, does not have as much emotional impact. At this point, the audience, having been manipulated time and again, feels as Andrew must, so caught up in the deceitful world of games-playing that it cannot feel remorse over the death of another person. Death has been rendered merely another bloodless, intellectual preoccupation. Milo’s final words, a parody of Andrew’s comment which ended act 1, echo with bloodless irony and typify the world he supposedly despises: “Game, set and match!”

Critical Context

When Sleuth premiered in London in 1970, it was called the play that critics could not review. Indeed, critics found it next to impossible to say anything about the subject of the play for fear of slipping up and revealing one of the many devious plot twists, and thus earning the wrath of those who had not yet seen it. Certainly Sleuth’s effectiveness depends to a large degree on its shocking plot devices. There is no denying, however, that the play’s two characters are more than two-dimensional plot foils. Both are strong, dynamic individuals who go far beyond the stereotypical stick figures found in plays which rely heavily on plot trickery as opposed to character development for their effectiveness. The language is especially lively and rich with witticisms, in keeping with the flamboyant nature of the characters themselves.

Sleuth was Anthony Shaffer’s first play. He had previously written detective novels with his brother Peter (also a successful playwright) under the pseudonym Peter Antony and worked on several television projects. Shaffer admitted that the inspiration for Sleuth came after learning that Agatha Christie, the undisputed queen of the parlor room style of murder mystery, was the most-published author in the world. Shaffer wanted both to send up Christie and the genre in which she excelled, and at the same time to use the elements inherent in this most popular genre. The result was an extremely commercially successful entertainment, a spellbinding crowd pleaser.

Like Sleuth, Shaffer’s other plays are playful and cunning variations on the traditional murder mystery. In Murderer (pr. 1975), the protagonist, like Sleuth’s Andrew Wyke, is obsessed with games-playing and likes to graphically reenact the crimes of celebrated murderers of the past. In The Case of the Oily Levantine (pr. 1977; also known as Whodunnit, pr. 1979), the play begins as a hilarious burlesque of the traditional drawing room mystery, complete with all the stock, stuffy, aristocratic characters, but then turns into a wild variation of the genre as all the characters suddenly reveal their true identities. Shaffer was enamored of the old “cozy crime” genre. In all of his works (which include the original screenplay for Alfred Hitchcock’s Frenzy, in 1972, and screen adaptations of some of Christie’s books featuring Hercule Poirot), Shaffer’s intent was both to honor and to harass the genre. However, his main concern was to entertain, to breathe new life into one of the most popular genres of all and enthrall his audience with the elements that have made the genre so successful and well loved.

Sources for Further Study

Gill, Brendan. “Things Going Wrong.” The New Yorker, November 21, 1970, 103.

Glenn, Jules. “Twins in the Theater: A Study of Plays by Peter and Anthony Shaffer.” Blood Brothers: Siblings as Writers, edited by Norman Kiell. New York: International University Press, 1983.

Gussow, Mel. “With Sleuth, Another Shaffer Catches Public Eye.” New York Times, November 18, 1970, p. 38.

Hewes, Henry. “Two Can Play at a Game.” Saturday Review, November 28, 1970.

Klein, Dennis A. Peter and Anthony Shaffer: A Reference Guide. Boston: G. K. Hall, 1982.

Morley, Sheridan. “The Whodunit That Did It Right: Sleuth Still Offers More than the Genre’s Usual Suspects.” International Herald Tribune, July 24, 2002, p. 9.

Newsweek. Review of Sleuth. November 23, 1970, 138.

Time. Review of Sleuth. March 30, 1970, 77.