June 22nd -July 2nd

Blockbuster hit musical tackles Glensheen murder mystery with wicked dialogue and evocative music

An heiress, kind and generous, is found dead in her bed. Her night nurse, lying lifeless on the staircase. A robbery? A clumsy break-in? A conspiracy? A scandal! Witness this dark musical that tackles the tale with wicked dialogue and evocative music. Writer Jeffrey Hatcher and composer Chan Poling “pulled off a spectacular feat with a shamelessly witty script and score (Star Tribune).”

On June 27, 1977, heiress Elisabeth Congdon was found dead in her bedroom in the Glensheen mansion, smothered with a silk pillow. Outside her room, the night nurse, Velma Pietila had been violently beaten to death with a candlestick by an intruder. Marjorie Caldwell, one of Elisabeth’s adopted daughter’s husband, Roger Caldwell, was arrested for the murder and sentenced to prison. What would follow, would become the most talked about murder case in the history of Minnesota. Many books have been written about this event, and the play deals accurately with the history – but more than a book or a newspaper account, Glensheen: The Musical explores human behavior, comments on law enforcement and the justice system, while recognizing that two human lives were taken on the summer night in 1977.

“Glensheen is like an episode of Columbo that has been cast by the Coen brothers. Marjorie and Roger are desperate characters, not so far removed from the world of Fargo,”

-Jeffrey Hatcher