extravaganza

a murder mystery party to DIE FOR

y’all, i just discovered my FAVORITE KIND OF PARTY.

ok, well, besides dance parties.

last friday, my friend tatiana invited henri and me over to a MURDER MYSTERY PARTY!! I KNOW, RIGHT?!! i’d always wanted to go to one, but the closest i ever got was the time that my parents and i were in las vegas right before christmas and all of the real shows were closed for a break so we went to this murder mystery dinner theater in a strip mall instead and well, yeah. let’s just say it was no cirque de soleil.

recently, my hankering for a little whodunit action went up to 11 after i saw “the office” murder mystery episode:

i mean, who doesn’t love speaking in ridiculously fake accents and emanating waves of intrigue?

since tatiana is a Master Party Planner Pants, she emailed us our character profiles in advance, along with the dress code (80s! holla!) and the warning that we would NOT be admitted into her home unless we were totally in character.

obvs, this was not a problem for henri and me. meet brooke fields and spruce steen!

check out our highly complex profiles:

Spruce is a talented rock n’ roll star, whose albums are skyrocketing off the charts. He sings about the common man and against the rich and greedy, yet he has a curious power over all. Spruce is Adam’s neighbor and a close friend of Noah Good. He and Brooke Fields have lived together for several years.

Brooke was raised in a show biz family and therefore her burning ambition is to follow in the footsteps of her family’s success. However, she is an exciting and adventurous rebel, who loves to shock people with her wickedly flagrant lifestyle. There is not a conventional bone in her body and she’s proud of it! She lives with Spruce Steen and, due to her great sense of humor, they have a lot of fun!

yeah we do! i mean, just look at those amazing outfits!

as we walked in, we met reporter whitney wordup and talk show host babra waters (seriously, it can’t be a good murder mystery party without ridiculously awesome names).

and here’s the fabulous hostess of the party, high profile socialite shirley good!

did i mention that the VICE PRESIDENT (harry lord… heh) was there?!!

as we introduced ourselves to everyone, i realized that most of the attendees were complete strangers to me. and while at most parties, it’s weird when you don’t know people, at a murder mystery party, it’s AWESOME. first of all, i didn’t know anyone’s real names, just their character names. second, i had no idea what they were like in real life, so it was impossible to tell when they were acting and then they weren’t.

case in point: prissy everest, international tennis star!

note the white powder under prissy’s nose. when i first met her, i was like, ha ha, that’s an awesome detail to her costume. and then she said, “heyyyy, let’s go to the bathroom together!” and i thought, “heh, yeah, totally! woo-hoo we’re acting!” and then we went into the bathroom and she pulled out a vial of white powder and i was like “oh man, girlfriend went all out… wait a minute. IS THAT REAL?” and y’all I HAD NO IDEA. until she looked at me and said, “you know this is just flour, right?” HA HA OF COURSE. obviously. ok! whew.

another example: noah good, mischievous playboy!

within ten minutes of our arrival, noah was hitting on me like a contestant on “the pick-up artist.” at first i was weirded out, but then i thought, “oh, he’s totally just playing his character, who is a total slimeball, so this makes sense.” so then i went along with it, until i remembered that scene from the office where andy asks erin out, and she thinks it’s part of the game, but he’s being super serious, and then i was like… umm?

by the end, though, i was sure he was just acting. well, pretty sure.

the official game play began with all of us reading introductions (given to us by tatiana, i mean, shirley). mine was particularly mortifying:

OMG, of course I’ll drink to a fun and exciting evening… especially if it gets wild and crazy! I’m Brooke Fields, daughter of the famous actor, W.P. Fields and awesome girlfriend of the fabulous Spruce Steen. Someday, I’d like to act out all of my fantasies, but my talents haven’t quite been discovered yet. I’m working on my exposure, every chance I get. Maybe if you’re lucky, I’ll give you a preview tonight!

so, basically, i was the miss scarlet of this party. except WAY less classy.

after a good bit of mingling, shirley turned the awesome up another notch by passing out individualized clues and directions to everyone. this is when things got JUICY, cos suddenly everyone had dark motives and secrets, and there hadn’t even been a murder yet!

of course, since i was playing the party skank, my clues were not so much sinister as they were hoebaggy. for example:

To whomever you please, relate how you and a friend took your shirts off and danced around topless at Spruce’s last concert.

(yeah, noah good really loved that one)

or, my personal favorite:

Tell Bob Briese (football player) that you really get turned on by the football players’ tight butts in their uniforms.

yeah, so while everyone else gets glimpses of skeletons in the closet, i get How To Be Trashy, 101. in spite of my misgivings (and the fact that, remember, no one knew me this party, so this was QUITE the first impression) as a dr. professional party pants, i had no choice but to follow the instructions. with my signature enthusiasm, obvs.

suddenly, shirley’s husband adam burst through the door and delivered this SHOCKING ANNOUNCEMENT: ROBIN COURT WAS MURDERED!!

HOLY AGATHA CHRISTIE!

it kind of made sense, given that every character seemed to have some grudge against robin, myself included (and for once, it had nothing to do with taking my top off. he apparently cheated my parents out of money). of course, since everyone hated him, EVERYONE WAS A SUSPECT! DUM DUM DUUUUUM!!

also, i love the part in the script where adam explains why it would just be easier to solve this murder ourselves. obvs!

we were then given more clues and instructions. mine included vital information such as:

You love being outrageous and partying as well.

Maybe all us groovy chicks here should lighten up these macho dudes with a little holiday celebration dance.

and, the most mysterious clue i received all night:

You are stoked to play your favorite game with Spruce tonight.

UM SAY WHAT?!!! what kind of murder mystery is this?!!

it should be pretty clear to you by this point that i did NOT commit the murder. hello, i was WAY too busy thinking about skanky business! plus, i was officially cleared when shirley somehow managed to obtain police evidence of finger prints on the scene, which narrowed down the list of suspects:

after that, things got a leeeetle cray cray.

looks like noah went to the bathroom with prissy!

it was only a matter of time before we all cracked and offered up our best explanations of innocence. there were some pretty convincing performances, but i think it’s safe to say that spruce pretty much ROCKED IT:

just when i thought the party would implode from the suspense, the murderer confessed!! OMG IT WAS SHIRLEY GOOD!

I NEVER WOULD HAVE GUESSED! probably cos i was too busy telling people all about how i like to take my top off.

the best part about solving a murder at a party? there’s no police involved! so, after you identify the killer, you can just drink more champers and play rock band! which is exactly what we did.

i never did figure out that game that spruce and i were supposed to play, though…

© 2009 Poshdeluxe.