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this needs a lot more work -len this needs a lot more work -len

Speakeasy Dollhouse is a book and play created, written, and directed by artist and author Cynthia von Buhler.

A True Story
Von Buhler's Italian immigrant grandparents, Frank and Mary Spano, owned two speakeasies in The Bronx during Prohibition. One masqueraded as a bakery and the other was a secret nightclub. Shortly after Prohibition ended, Frank Spano was shot and killed on the street in Manhattan.

The Dollhouse Sets
At the time of Frank Spano's death, innumerable murders went unsolved because evidence was mishandled or downright ignored. In 1936, as a means to better explore these cases and train investigators of sudden or violent deaths to assess visual evidence, Frances Glessner Lee created the Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death. These studies consisted of detailed, 1:12 scale dollhouse models that students could examine from every angle. Taking inspiration from the Nutshell Studies, von Buhler created the scenes from her grandfather's murder and the events leading up to it using her own handmade sets and dolls. Utilizing evidence gathered from autopsy reports, police records, court documents, and interviews in tandem with the dolls and sets, she has pieced together a variety of probable scenarios.

The Immersive Play
Von Buhler is staging her findings as an immersive theatrical experience. Each month a new theme is explored as a possible motive for the murder. The play stages these events in mobster Meyer Lansky's former hangout on the Lower East Side. Von Buhler has set up the location to mirror her dollhouse sets. There is a speakeasy bar, a private alleyway, a club cum living room, a bakery, a coroner's office and a pre-war bedroom. The audience is encouraged to "ignore the advice your parents gave you as children, be nosy and talk to strangers." Each audience member receives a role upon entrance to the speakeasy.

The play was created in conjunction with the introductory graphic novel Speakeasy Dollhouse, The Bloody Beginning. The play originally began as a two-night show (funded by Kickstarter) in October of 2011. The play has been extended twice due to popular demand and will continue into 2013.

The play is also being used as research for another book von Buhler is writing. The Bloody Beginning was the introduction to the story and explains how von Buhler first heard about her grandfather's mysterious death when she was a young girl. The follow-up will reveal the fruits of her extensive research labors. In a New York Times interview, von Buhler stated that the follow-up book would be a new genre, "Pulp Non-Fiction" She has also insinuated that she will be continuing the graphic novel series illustrated with her handmade dolls and sets.

Television
Von Buhler, the coroner's office diorama, and the play's secret location were central to an episode of The Discovery Channel's reality television show Oddities. The episode titled A Gurney for Grandpa focuses on the televisions show's stars Mike Zohn and Evan Michelson as they locate an antique gurney for the play to match the miniature one von Buhler used in her crime scene diorama.

Film
Of Dolls and Murder], directed by Susan Marks and narrated by John Waters is a documentary about Frances Glessner Lee's crime scene investigation dollhouse dioramas. Marks is currently working on an Of Dolls and Murder sequel about Speakeasy Dollhouse.