Halliday, you see, writes television murder-mysteries, giving him insights that will come in handy when the nefarious Tony Wendice (Jim McCabe) hires a killer to carry out his plan to dispose of his wealthy wife.

Most people are more familiar with the 1954 film version of Frederick Knott's 1952 play, directed by Alfred Hitchcock and starring Ray Milland and Grace Kelly as the Wendices and Robert Cummings as Halliday. But since Knott also wrote the screenplay, the scripts are similar, and similarly engaging.

Hedgerow's season always opens with a mystery, and the company's affection for the genre is palpable: another year, another drawing room, another part for Zoran Kovcic as some sort of no-nonsense gumshoe - here, Scotland Yard's Inspector Hubbard. At this point, it's as recognizably a sign of autumn as apple-cider doughnuts and pick-your-own-pumpkin patches.

As directed by Jared Reed, the production's first act is slack, but it tightens, like, say, a garotte (a very elegant garotte) during the second. And while I'm not sure who was responsible for siting the shadows cast by a pair of Palladian windows askew against the Wendices' apartment wall - Reed, in a triple role as sound and lighting designer, or Kovcic, doubling as set designer - it was a nice, ominous touch.

Unfortunately, Painter, limp and wan, with a lazy accent of indistinguishable origin, is no Grace Kelly, although oddly and to her credit, she comes through like a champ when she's being strangled. Smith, meanwhile, is too green, neither compelling nor cocky enough to create a clear contrast with his English hosts.

So it's lucky for both that they get to play off McCabe, a former merchant marine who wisely traded in his sea legs for soliloquies, and who with each appearance raises the professionalism of the entire cast. He is largely responsible for balancing the show's chuckle-to-nail-biting ratio and navigating us through the vertigo-inducing twists and turns of Knott's plot.

It's a pretty great plot, too. If you haven't seen the film in a while, leave it be - there's no substitute for watching the drama unravel live, and trying to stitch it up tightly with your own sleuthing before an inspector calls to lay it all out for you.

Dial M for Murder

Through Nov. 1 at Hedgerow Theatre, 64 Rose Valley Rd., Media. Tickets: $22-$25. Information: 610-565-4211 or www.hedgerow

theatre.org.