By Joseph Kesselring
Arsenic and Old Lace is a classic dark comedy filled with mistaken identities, family secrets, and increasingly outrageous surprises. Mortimer Brewster, a theatre critic from a respectable Brooklyn family, is ready to begin a new life with the woman he loves. But a visit to his sweet, elderly aunts reveals a shocking discovery: their charming home hides a very unusual and very deadly habit.
As Mortimer tries to manage the impossible situation, his eccentric family only makes things worse. One relative believes he is Teddy Roosevelt, another returns home with a sinister past, and the aunts remain cheerfully convinced that their actions are acts of kindness. Fast-paced, witty, and delightfully macabre, Arsenic and Old Lace is a beloved comedy about one very proper family with some very improper secrets.