Have you ever wanted to play a real-life game of Clue? Or wanted to exercise some improv skills with a group of friends? If the answer is “Yes!” to either question, you should throw a murder mystery party.

My friends threw one for Halloween, and I was a bit apprehensive about whether I’d like it or not. I’d done one once before, but it was way back in middle school (and I don’t think we did it very well then), so I was pretty rusty on how the whole thing worked.

If you’ve ever played Clue, a murder mystery party is essentially a real-life game of it. Everyone is assigned a character (and corresponding costume guidelines), and then there are a few “rounds,” in which everyone participating is given an envelope which has some explanation of each character’s backstory, things to keep secret, and things to ask more about or share with others.

In the game we played, we were a group of diverse guests at a small town’s masquerade ball. We all had monochromatic outfit guidelines related to our characters’ names (much like Clue), including masks, of course. My character was Freddie Fuschia, a jockey whose horse’s owners were pressuring him to give his horse performance-enhancing drugs. My story ended up being completely irrelevant to the larger plot, but as they say, there are no small parts, only small actors.

We aren’t generally a group of actors, so there was a lot of breaking character, giggling and saying things like, “I don’t think I’m supposed to tell you that” (at least on my part). But some people really impressed me with their acting chops. I think our group struck a nice balance between trying to genuinely play the game and having fun with it.

Unfortunately, when it came time to guess the murderer, almost all of us incorrectly guessed one character (even the person who played him!), while only one person got it right. Despite most of our failure at guessing, it was a fun night that pushed me out of my comfort zone. I’d definitely do it again if my friends decide to make this a tradition.

— Hannah Gruen, advertising & events coordinator