College Lawyer In Murder Plot

Parkhurst's Gorman Reveals Secret Life as Outlaw

Some lawyers relax by playing golf or skiing. Some read Blackstone or write law review articles. I murder people.

Not for real, of course—I'm a lawyer for the College. But for the past two years I've spent the weekend before Thanksgiving in the cast of the annual Lake Morey Inn Murder Mystery in Fairlee, Vt. The first year I played a stuffy and incompetent lawyer—not a murderer, but a major suspect. This year I was promoted to perpetrator, one of two murderers. Next year I may get to be a victim.

For the inn the weekend fills the gap between foliage and ski season. For the actors—mostly members of The Parish Players of Thetford, Vt.—it's a chance to stretch their talents during a two-and-a-half day improvisation, always staying in character, sometimes turning up dead. For the guests the challenge is to figure out who done it—with the best guess winning a free weekend back at the inn. And the guests are pretty dogged in their pursuit of clues. The cast has to leak just enough information to keep them interested, pull off the murders (four this year), and keep everyone guessing till the denouement. This time we had to do it all in a southern accent.

That's because the scenario revolved around the jealousies and ambitions of a group of country & western recording artists, the possible involvement of some suspicious red herrings, and the eventual resolution by a posse of state and local cops and medical examiners. Luckily I didn't have to sing, just murder people. But staying in character got a bit harder when I spotted a classmate among the guests. Turned out that he and his wife are innkeepers who were checking out the prospects of running such an event themselves; they didn't blow my cover. (Thanks, Neil Van Dyke.)

So, everything went well. Everyone died who was supposed to, and in pretty much the prescribed manner. Under the prodding of the cops and before the assembled guests, I confessed to two of the murders Sunday morning. My coconspirator confessed to the others. (Though I have never practiced criminal law, I am reasonably certain that our confessions would be inadmissible at trial. But, hey, this is theater.)