Double Indemnity

Murder has a glamorous allure for even the most cultured of audiences. Tom Holloway has cannily adapted Double Indemnity from the novella by James M Cain, the American former journalist who first penned that other 'hardboiled' crime classic The Postman Always Rings Twice. But this atmospherically thrilling Melbourne Theatre Company production — directed by Sam Strong — owes as much to Billy Wilder's 1944 film version, being high noir. 

Double Indemnity's backdrop is Depression-faded California. A weathered Leon Ford portrays insurance agent (and narrator) Walter Huff. Huff encounters the desperately seductive housewife Phyllis Nirdlinger — an unrecognisable Claire van der Boom in blonde wig, evoking Hollywood's immortal Barbara Stanwyck — when he calls on her husband to renew his automobile insurance. Phyllis enquires about taking out a life policy on her absent spouse. The salesman — cerebral, cynical and conniving — and femme fatale, ominously opaque, embark on an affair and an audacious scheme. And it only gets murkier.

Ford and van der Boom work easily together, having previously co-starred in the Steven Spielberg-backed mini-series The Pacific (moreover, van der Boom has appeared in glittery US TV shows like Constantine). Yet equally marvellous is the play's extravagantly cinematic staging, complete with rotating set. Holloway's Double Indemnity retains Cain's sharp dialogue — and gritty humour. And, as an added comic irony, the MTC's "corporate partner" is an insurance co.