Who is popular today?

Will it be Miss Scarlett with the lead pipe? Or that horrid Colonel Mustard? Mark Bell explains why the board game’s enduring appeal makes it ideal for the stage”There are always moments in a comedy which you’re convinced are going to bring the house down,” says actor and director Mark Bell. “Then, on the first night, it gets nothing.”Bell has made his name from things not going to plan. Director of the riotous The Play That Goes Wrong, he has created a career out of mishap and mayhem. When the tech breaks down during our Zoom call, he jokes about this being his trademark. Now Bell is directing a stage play of Cluedo, which even after more than 70 years remains one of the world’s most popular board games. Written by Sandy Rustin and starring the former EastEnders actor Michelle Collins, this comedy-thriller adaptation is based on Jonathan Lynn’s 1985 film Clue, about a group of strangers invited to a manor house on a stormy night. On arrival, they are given aliases – Professor Plum, Colonel Mustard, the characters we all know and love to suspect – and are told not to reveal who they really are. Continue reading...