One late evening on campus, a menagerie of students disguised as pirates, mushrooms and Victorian corpses gathered in Jamrich Hall to solve a murder.

The context of this scheme is purely fictional, a production made by the Hollywood Murder Mystery group. A rowdy duo of improv professionals, or the detectives of the night, staged a mysterious kidnapping. 

The subject, a famous pop star, had been taken from her dressing room just before her album release party began. 

Lying on the floor was Taylor Swift’s phone, surrounded by signs of a struggle. Her album “1989” was shattered on the ground. Detective Schroider, Detective Moore and their friendly unseen junior detective Terry took on the case.

The students present for the event were given celebrity aliases to enhance the experience of a true Hollywood party.

“Try “1989.” No? You already tried that? It seemed too obvious? Okay, fine,” Detective Schroider sulked.

Ariana Grande raised her whistle-toned voice from the audience. Using her knowledge of Taylor Swift’s lucky numbers, 1213, she solved the first puzzle and unlocked the phone. Detective Terry investigated the phone’s contents while the others investigated the most prevalent suspects.

In the midst of the investigation, the celebrities in the crowd couldn’t contain their need to be adored and were invited on stage by the detectives to show off their beautiful costumes. The first costume party of the season couldn’t be dragged down by this tragedy – it was time for a photoshoot.

 Amongst the crowd of artists and talent were friends and enemies of Taylor. Her boyfriend, Travis Kelce, her best friend Ice Spice and her frenemy Katy Perry were among those who caught the attention of the detectives. 

Junior Detective Terry made quick work of drawing up motives for the unsuspecting suspects.

 “We also found these two plane tickets from Escape Airlines, conveniently named tickets found in Travis’s coat pocket, which was hanging in the dresser, tickets for another woman, Andrea,” Detective Schroider revealed. “Travis, who’s Andrea?”

“Probably my mom or my sister or something?” Kelce retorted in surprise.

Although there were five other suspects involved, Katy Perry’s appearance at the album party stirred up some trouble. It’s well known that Taylor and Katy have bad blood between them, and the detectives’ investigation uncovered yet another sinister motive.

Lyrics of a new song meant to be released by Taylor the night of the album release party were found at the scene. The draft of the lyrics was initially signed by Katy Perry, however Taylor seemed to have crossed out Perry’s name and replaced it with her own. Katy begrudgingly refused to give comment on this piece of evidence, even after Detective Moore performed the song in front of the crowd.

A tragic looking lineup of cartoon characters formed. Teenage Dracula and Detective Moore’s high school sweetheart were part of the line up, but none of these mysteriously off-putting characters had any motive or connection to the pop star. 

Attention was once again directed to the main lineup of suspects when a threatening letter arrived for the detectives.

“She was never a California girl, so I took her to the real Music City, a place where she’ll finally work nine to five. She’s no longer bigger than me,” the ransom letter stated.

The kidnapper attempted to frame Dolly Parton, however, there were two flaws with this plan. Firstly, Dolly wasn’t present at the album party, so it couldn’t have been her, and secondly, the egotistical kidnapper couldn’t stop themselves from using their own songs in the ransom note.

The crowd instantly knew what Katy Perry had done. She had kidnapped Taylor to prevent the album from being released and take back her supposedly stolen songs that were to be released on said album. 

The duo of detectives congratulated the students on their ability to solve the case and disappeared into the night. The crowd exited in excitement, gathering outside of the lecture hall, and proudly showed off their costumes while discussing the events of the night. Everyone had found a mini game or activity to fit their personal interests. 

Vann Squier, or Vincent Van Gogh, explained, “While things may go easier if you are a Taylor Swift Fan and you recognize the names a bit more, there [were] still a whole bunch of events that catered to anyone.”

This event served as a warm welcome to the spooky season hosted by Primetime Productions, a student organization that provides a space for creative students to find their extroverted side and have fun. The duo that captivated everyone’s attention for the night were a part of Mission Improvable, an improv group that regularly travels around the country putting on similar events.

Primetime Productions holds meetings on Fridays at 1 p.m. in the Hunt Hall lobby to discuss future club events.