MURDER GIRL to Close Season at Peninsula Players Theatre

Peninsula Players Theatre will conclude its 91st season with Murder Girl (September 9 - October 18), a funny and thrilling Wisconsin whodunnit by Heidi Armbruster. Directed by Mallory Metoxen, this suspenseful mystery unfolds in a timeworn Wisconsin supper club as the eccentric ensemble of characters question each other about the disappearance of a missing employee while making brandy old fashioneds and tasting the night's prime rib.

Sponsored by Door County Medical Center and Barbara & Richard Board, Murder Girl performs Tuesdays through Sundays at 7:00 p.m., except for Sunday, October 4 and 18, at 2:00 p.m. Tickets are $54, $56 and $59 and student prices and group tickets (parties of 15 or more) are also available. For tickets or more information, call the Box Office at (920) 868-3287 or visit PeninsulaPlayers.com.

Murder Girl is set at Marty's Supper Club in the Northwoods of Wisconsin, where the old fashioneds are mixed, the Packer game is on, and the secrets run deep. Twins Eric and LeeAnn are trying to keep the business alive when a shocking revelation from one of their employees sparks new questions about a missing girl and a past that refuses to stay buried. Full of suspense, small-town gossip, and Midwestern heart, this sharply funny mystery will have everyone guessing until the final moments.

Playwright Heidi Armbruster has Wisconsin roots and splits her time between Brooklyn and Milwaukee. Murder Girl received its world premiere in the 2024 season at Forward Theater Company in Madison, Wisconsin after workshops at Forward Theater Company, Third Avenue PlayWorks, and others. Murder Girl had its second production last year at Milwaukee Chamber Theatre.

When asked what it was like developing the play after its prior productions, Armbruster said:

'I've loved having the chance to keep learning from the play in front of different actors and different audiences. Each production and collaboration has taught me about the play. At this point, I am not reinventing the play, but tightening it and deepening it: where does the mystery need more clarity, where can the comedy be sharper, where information can be planted more elegantly, and where the relationships among these people can carry more of the story.

I also love that Murder Girl has essentially been grown in Wisconsin: Madison, Milwaukee, and now Door County. I'm from Wisconsin myself, so there's something especially satisfying to me about letting the play develop here, across three very different Wisconsin communities, before it goes out into the wider world. And Peninsula Players Theatre feels like a particularly good place for this next chapter. Murder Girl is about a small community where everybody has known everybody forever, old stories have become local mythology, and people's lives are tangled up with one another in ways they can't entirely escape. There's something about bringing that story to Door County - and to an audience that understands the particular intimacy of a place with a long memory - that feels very right."

Portraying the twin co-owners of Marty's Supper Club, Eric and LeeAnn, are Garrett Lutz (The Mousetrap, Ken Ludwig's Moon Over Buffalo) and Isabelle Muthiah (Ken Ludwig's Moon Over Buffalo) respectively. They are joined by two waitresses: Charlotte, played by Laura T. Fisher (Ken Ludwig's Moon Over Buffalo) and 'Other Charlotte' played by Charlotte Booker (Ripcord, Write Me a Murder). Rounding out the ensemble is Ted the Cook, played by Peninsula Players Theatre newcomer, Joe Picchetti, who will be familiar to Door County audiences for having appeared in The Bachelors with Northern Sky Theater last season.

Director Mallory Metoxen has directed numerous productions in Wisconsin including No Wake at Third Avenue PlayWorks in 2024 and L'Appartement, Sex with Strangers, The Drowning Girls, and The Understudy at Renaissance Theaterworks in Milwaukee. She returns to Peninsula Players Theatre after having participated in the internship program in 2008, before pursuing her career in directing.

The creative team includes Kärin Simonson Kopischke, costume design (Moon Over Buffalo, Little Women The Broadway Musical, Silent Sky); Christopher Kriz, sound design (Misery, Mary's Wedding, Trying); Jack Magaw, scenic design (Misery, Dear Jack, Dear Louise, Mary's Wedding); and Noele Stollmack, lighting design (Steel Magnolias, Mary's Wedding).

Peninsula Players Theatre is a professional, not-for-profit theatre, that employs members of Actors' Equity Association (AEA), the union of professional actors and stage managers; United Scenic Artists (USA), the labor union and professional association of designers, artists, and craftspeople; and the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society (SDC), the theatrical union of stage directors and choreographers.

In the autumn, the Theatre's all-weather pavilion features in-floor radiant heat to take the chill out of the air, but as Mother Nature is the Theatre's lobby, patrons should dress for the weather and be prepared for shifting temperatures and breezes off the bay. Peninsula Players Theatre is a smoke-free campus. Smoking is prohibited on the grounds at all times. Audience members are invited to come early for a pre-show beverage or snack at the Luna Bar and Canteen with a pre-show bonfire, weather permitting. The grounds open 90 minutes before the show.

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