The Murder Mystery Party

John and I hosted a murder mystery party tonight. It was called "A Taste for Wine and Murder." Having done quite a few of these we have a favorite brand, BePuzzled. There's less improv required which makes it easier and more fun.

I was Tiny Bubbles--on my third husband--the first two having died suspiciously leaving me a wealthy woman. John played my husband, Ralph Rottingrape. A ne'er-do-well who inherited a vineyard.

Our dinner guests played their parts fabulously. Our friend, Steve, was Otto Von Schnapps. Before the party started, he posed on our front lawn and called out to our neighbors that he would be posing there nightly.

Speaking of posing, Steve's wife, Marybeth, played Marilyn Merlot who had some posings in her past she wanted to forget--which of course was revealed during the evening. The thing about murder mystery parties is that everyone is suspicious making it difficult to guess the killer.

Rhonda played Hedy Shablee, a vineyard owner with mob ties and Troy played Papa Vito, an aged vineyard worker from Italy who was bitter that he hadn't been compensated for his life's work. Only with Troy playing him, he sounded less like an Italian and more like an old Jewish man from New York.

At one point in the evening, Steve stepped out to make a phone call to check on his kids and we had a bit of fun at his expense. You see, earlier in the evening, Steve hadn't read all of his booklet and wound up a bit lost in the drama. So...

When Steve came back into the room, Troy said, "he was a nice looking young man, one thing led to another, what was I supposed to do...." Then John added, "Yeah, but Otto (Steve)? You had a fling with Otto?"

At which point, Steve begins feverishly looking through his book to see how he missed this development. Then looking at John replies, "You made me wear this get-up and you made me gay????"

I'm afraid I'm the one who gave it away because I couldn't quit laughing. Troy will say I snorted. (Which I'm certain I did not.)

In any case, we had a wonderful time laughing all night long. At one point in our lives, we threw one of these annually. John and I realized that we bought the scripts for the one we did last night 10 years ago and never got around to it. Rest assured, we won't wait that long to host another one.