Frinton Summer Theatre didn't make a drama out of its crisis last night - but it did delay the second act for ten minutes.
The crisis in the kitchen on the first night of the thriller Edge of Darkness produced an unusual behind-the-scenes drama.
Friends of the theatre preparing coffee in the kitchen, ready for the first interval, smelt gas.
They turned off the gas rings on the WI hall's domestic cooker, removed the kettles and turned off the supply before calling for some emergency help.
The gas man came to deal with what the audience were told was a "technical hitch".
He checked over the cooker and the supply, isolated one of the burners and took the knob away so the ring could not be used.
Elizabeth Garratt, who was brewing in the kitchen, said the gas man was more concerned about how he was going to get out of the kitchen without going across the stage of the tiny hall.
In the end, he made a quick exit out of the kitchen window and into Ashlyns Road.
The mystery of the leak was solved well before the audience grappled with the secrets behind the Victorian mystery Edge of Darkness.
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