Line #15 Recap/MurderSheWroteS3E9StageStruck


1	Two of Jessica's old friends, Julian Lord and Maggie Tarrow, invite her back to the theatre where they all used to work for a revival of a play. However, more than the usual amount of trouble plagues the performance -- first Maggie suffers a shock and faints mid-rehearsal, and then her understudy, Barbara, dies on-stage.
2	!!This episode includes examples of the following tropes:
3	* AbsenceOfEvidence: The glass Barbara drank from disappeared shortly after she died because Julian was aware that microscopic traces of the cyanide that he had laced it with could be uncovered at a lab no matter how he cleaned it.
4	* BitchInSheepsClothing: Barbara pretended to be nice, but secretly planned to blackmail Julian.
5	* BitterAlmonds: The attempts on the actors' lives involved cyanide.
6	* BlackmailBackfire: When Jessica confronts Julian backstage, it turns out that Barbara had tried to blackmail him into performing with her that night with the knowledge that he and Maggie had conceived and given up a child. Suspecting she would never quit, Julian poisoned her to protect Maggie from her attacks.
7	* {{Expy}}: As actors famed for their destructive romance and known for their problems with alcohol, Julian Lord and Maggie Tarrow seem to be expies of Creator/RichardBurton and Creator/ElizabethTaylor, respectively.
8	* GratuitousFrench: The local police chief, an amateur actor, uses really bad French while discussing Barbara's death. Julian and Alexander realize, the former amused and the latter aghast, that he's trying to imitate Franchise/HerculePoirot.
9	* HandsOnApproach: Implied when Jessica has an audio flashback about her time in the theatre. She admits that perspective completely throws her off, and the younger Frank offers to guide her brush hand.
10	* InspectorLestrade: The chief of police asks Jessica for her help, but then proceeds to jump the gun multiple times and assume the guilt of one of the suspects, in multiple cases against the evidence. In the final case, he continues his accusation even when Jessica tries to stop him and shuts down her protests.
11	* LargeHam: Chief Drock is a character. That is, Chief Drock treats his role as "chief" as a role on stage, making flourishes, and overdramatic statements and speeches.
12	* MurderByMistake: Jessica originally suggests that the killer intended to poison Maggie, not Barbara. Chief Drock even says the trope by name. However, then she discovers that Barbara never drank the poisoned wine, and realizes that, given how fast cyanide works, Barbara had to have been poisoned after taking over for Maggie.
13	* OverlyNarrowSuperlative: Jessica says that she was the second-best set painter in the theatre thirty years ago. However, she then admits that the theatre only kept two set designers on staff.
14	* PlotAllergy: Jessica reasons that Barbara was poisoned onstage, not by the wine in the dressing room, because she had an allergy to red wine and never drank it. The wine was poisoned afterward as a RedHerring.
15	* PoliceAreUseless: It appears Chief Drock's investigative skills suck even harder than his acting.
16	* RedHerring: Invoked. Julian poisons the decanter during the second performance of the play in an effort to strengthen the idea of Maggie being the actual target for the poison which killed Barbara.
17	* SkewedPriorities: Upon Holt being captured while trying to escape, the chief is informed that the play he's in starts in thirty minutes, and he quickly drops everything to get ready.
18	* StigmaticPregnancyEuphemism: Thirty years earlier, Maggie Tarrow unexpectedly left a show mid-performance, claiming she had a movie offer, years before her first film came out. She disappeared "abroad" for "almost a year". As Jessica quickly realizes, "nine months is almost a year".
19	* TilMurderDoUsPart: A scene from the play involves a couple planning to kill their spouses and marry each other for the third time.

Context Recap / MurderSheWroteS3E9StageStruck