39 Steps

39 Steps was a phenomenal performance! This play seemed to fit right into the British Mystery Novel class because it is a mystery and it is British, but of course the representation and their interpretation of 39 Steps caused the audience to focus more on the satire and comedy than the mystery that the play contained. I think that for the play to be included solely in the mystery genre it would have to be interpreted in a less comedic way so that the mystery could actually be taken seriously by the audience. As it was all that I, as an observer, was interested in was where the next comic gag was coming from and less of what the 39 Steps were. While a different interpretation of the play may have fitting it nicely within the mystery genre this interpretation does prove to be a parody of a cozy.

39 Steps provides what is supposed to be an amateur detective story but it is filled with lots of comedic relief. I really enjoyed watching the four characters play so many different parts with all of the costume and accent changes. The play relies a lot on the stereotypes that everyone in the audience, no matter their cultural background, would readily identify; the English detective with his fedora and tweed coat that drinks, smokes, and is a bored womanizer, the seductive female spy with the foreign accent, and the assassins in the trench coats under the street light. Most of these stereotypes are included in the original cozy mystery but not to the great extent that it was portrayed in the play where they were done over the top, much to the enjoyment and laughter of all the audience.