The Little Theatre’s production of Dangerous Corner is mystery at its best. Every character is layered and complex with motives upon motives and secrets within secrets, all deftly portrayed by a stellar cast that, frankly, belong on a West End stage.

J B Priestley’s play is a wonderful piece of writing. Every line drips with meaning and every word serves a purpose. As such it is vitally important that the cast clearly and accurately deliver the dialogue, lest all that subtlety be lost. This cast not only delivers their lines with crystal clarity but do so with much passion.

The play opens with Freda Caplan (Joy Brankin-Frisby) and Betty Whitehouse (Rachael Humphrey)—wives of two of the directors of a publishing firm—hosting novelist Maud Mockridge (Angela Hill) and friend Olwen Peel (Kat Lenthall).

Maud is an absolute gossip who brings up the topic of Freda’s brother-in-law and firm director Martin Caplan who died by suicide the previous year. This invokes a range of reactions from the other women who seem not to want to discuss the topic. At this point, the firm directors Robert Caplan (John Moulding), Gordon Whitehouse (Stuart Bryan) and Charles Stanton (Paul Beasley) come in from the other room and join the party.

The conversation soon turns philosophical. Is the complete truth a good thing? Some argue that the complete truth is a dangerous thing, whereas others profess a devotion to living a truthful life, though not everyone seems to believe those that say this.

To lighten the mood, Freda offers chocolates around from a music box. But this soon becomes the centre of much controversy, with the ensuing argument encouraged by the pot stirring of Maud who leaves when tensions rise.

The rest of the play delves deep into the theme of truthfulness and secrets as the remaining characters bat allegations and accusations, revelations and postulations back-and-forth with ever growing ferocity.

The core cast are all equally impressive in their roles. Every member of the cast clearly understands their character inside and out and tap into that knowledge throughout the play, delivering well-rounded and nuanced portrayals of very complex characters.

Although Hill has relatively little stage time as Maud, she delights with every remark, embracing her character’s playful gossipiness through tone of voice and energy.

The whole cast work like a well-oiled machine and all have excellent chemistry together making the relationships and friendships believable.

Of course, it helps that Priestly has written a near perfect pressure-cooker play, but John Ghent delivers it with perfect direction. Not a beat is missed. The movement of the cast on the stage is almost dance-like in its choreography, physically signposting changes in mood and heightening the tension.

The play is dialogue-heavy with many twists and turns. In less capable hands it could become a muddy mess of confusion. But Ghent skilfully uses his extremely capable cast to deliver a sublime play full of mystery that is gripping from start to finish.

All of the action takes place in the drawing room of the Caplan’s house. This is wonderfully portrayed by Gem Greaves’ delightful set design. Coupled with John Bale’s costume design, the audience is pulled into the 1930s. Jeremy Thompson’s lighting design and Andrew Northcote’s sound design add to the building tension throughout.

The incredible cast, perfect direction and deliciously deceptive script combine to make the Little Theatre’s production of Dangerous Corner an absolute must-see.