REVIEW: Midsomer Murders - The Killings at Badgers Drift

By Gary Murray, volunteer reviewer 

Many people will be familiar with Midsomer Murders. Based on the books by Caroline Graham, it has run on ITV since 1997 starring John Nettles as Detective Chief Inspector Tom Barnaby then latterly Neil Dudgeon as his cousin DCI John Barnaby. 

Set in the fictional county of Midsomer, it features chocolate box villages, thatched roofs, cream teas … and murder! For Midsomer, with its "tangled relationships going back many years", turns out to be the murder capital of Middle England: "blood behind the Begonias!"

There’s danger around every corner it seems. You can be walking in the woods minding your own business and you are felled by a giant cheese truckle hurtling down a slope, or your wheelchair might be remotely controlled into the path of an oncoming milk lorry. There is no respite at the annual fair either: you try to escape it all on the Ghost Train only to be despatched with an antique sword.   

So there was much anticipation for this new adaptation of the very first story The Killings at Badgers Drift which is in Eastbourne this week as part of a UK and Ireland tour. 

That Midsomer Murders is much loved was evidenced by the large audience at the Devonshire Park on the first night. How would the long-running series translate to the stage? 

The melodramatic opening music tells us that this production isn’t going to take itself too seriously. 

Emily Simpson is out in the woods one day looking for Ghost Orchids when she comes across something shocking in the undergrowth. Later she is discovered dead in her cottage, seemingly as the result of an accident. But her good friend Lucy Bellringer (Julie Legrand) refuses to accept that foul play isn’t at work. 

So begins an everyday story of country folk doing what they really oughtn’t to be doing. 

Soon we meet Detective Chief Inspector Tom Barnaby (Daniel Casey) and DS Gavin Troy (James Bradwell) who are called in to investigate. 

Daniel Casey played DS Gavin Troy in the original TV series. In many ways, he has the most difficult job of the evening. Surrounded by Midsomer eccentrics, he has to be the calm centre of the story. 

Barnaby has none of the usual detective tropes loved by TV drama: no crumbling marriage, no alcohol problem, no trauma from a previous case. Daniel Casey also has the long shadow of John Nettles to contend with. But by and large he does a decent job. As does James Bradwell as Troy who really makes the character his own. 

It’s just that the first half of this play is too full of static scenes with too much turgid exposition. There is far too much of the detectives standing still listening to who might have done what to whom. While on television that can be mitigated with a change of setting, on stage it requires something more to bring it to life.

An example of that is a scene where Troy attempts to reconstruct a previous killing with gnomes (stay with me!) but what could have been something doesn’t really go anywhere and peters out a bit half-heartedly. 

That said, there are some lovely characterisations here: Julie Legrand as Lucy Bellringer, Chandrika Chevli and John Dougall as Barbara and Trevor Lessiter, Rupert Sadler as slightly unhinged undertaker Dennis Rainbird (a man you wouldn’t trust with a butterknife quite frankly) and John Dougall again as his mother Iris. 

The second half is much better. Staged more imaginatively, it zips along with momentum towards its conclusion where the killer is unmasked.

So why is the first half so stodgy? 

Yes, Midsomer Murders has a whole barn full of goodwill from the TV show – and many of the audience would already have known the plot – but it still needs to try a bit harder to be more than just a rehash. 

If I hadn’t known the story, then I might have been a touch confused, particularly the historical element. 

But if you are a fan, you’ll still have a good fun evening in the company of some of the most eccentric – and dangerous – inhabitants of Midsomer.   

:: Midsomer Murders: The Killings at Badgers Drift runs at the Devonshire Park Theatre until Saturday 22 November. Tickets available here 

 :: Gary Murray was a professional actor for 14 years in theatre, radio, TV and even a couple of operas. After many years on the tech side of the ticketing industry, he now works at Tech Resort and is a volunteer reviewer for Eastbourne Reporter