Description

Frank Cullen & Donald McNeilly, recipients of The Theatre Museum of NYC's 2011 Award for Excellence in the Preservation of Theatre History, have unearthed another Porridge Sisters' adventure. Murder at the Orpheum Theatre, the third of the projected seven Porridge Sisters Adventure, occurs in 1916 when Americans are divided whether the USA should join the Great War in Europe. Suspicions abound regarding sabotage, spies and foreign nationals. The 'Spanish Flu' is about to become an epidemic; suffragettes are campaigning for the right to vote; discontent is growing within the Boston Police Force; moralists are beating the drum to ban demon rum, and gangsters are waiting in the wings to bootleg booze in defiance of Prohibition. Transcendentalists and bohemians, searching for enlightenment, are turning to alternative philosophies. Portridge Arms has become a success although the popularity of silent motion pictures is challenging vaudeville supremacy. Lavinia is relieved; Florrie is disconsolate-until they, the Porridge Sisters, along with Inspector Brody and the charming and idiosyncratic Castle Street Irregulars, become embroiled in the Murders at the Orpheum Theatre.