Interrogation.

0:00 · Cold open: the empty wall

0:00Host B August, 1911. The Louvre is closed for cleaning. A painter walks in to copy the most famous face in the world.

0:09Host A The Mona Lisa.

0:10Host B The Mona Lisa. And on the wall, four iron pegs. That's it.

0:14Host A Wait. Just... pegs?

0:16Host B A guard figured the photographers had borrowed it.

0:19Host A Ha! A photo shoot. Sure.

0:21Host B The police promised to have it back in two or three days.

0:25Host A And how did that go?

0:26Host B Two years.

0:29Host A Okay, I'm in. But we're not just telling the story, are we?

0:32Host B Nope. Today we play it. A whole game night, start to finish.

0:36Host A And I've never played.

0:38Host B Perfect. You're a detective tonight.

0:41 · How an Interrogation night works

0:42Host B Quick version. Interrogation is a mystery game for your own group.

0:46Host B One person runs the night. Detectives read and ask. One player is secretly the perpetrator, and some are suspects. Everyone else watches.

0:56Host A And the case is real?

0:58Host B Real history, adapted for play. The facts are public. We just turn them into evidence cards.

1:04Host A Adapted for play. Got it.

1:06Host B And every screen in a phone frame today is the real app. No mockups.

1:11 · The 1911 case file

1:12Host B Here's the real case file. Monday the twenty-first of August, the Louvre is closed to visitors.

1:18Host B Tuesday morning, Louis Béroud finds the empty wall. The museum is searched room by room, and closed for a week.

1:27Host A And nobody got hurt?

1:28Host B Nobody. A heist with no villain waving a weapon. Perfect for game night.

1:34Host A Ha. Fine, so who did it?

1:35Host B That's the game.

1:37Host B Five names go on the suspect list. A poet, Guillaume Apollinaire. His friend, Pablo Picasso.

1:44Host A Picasso? The Picasso?

1:46Host B The very same. A judge questioned him in 1911.

1:51Host B Then Géry Pieret, a glazier named Vincenzo Peruggia, and a con man from a story that only appears in 1932.

2:01Host A Okay, I already suspect Picasso.

2:03Host B Everybody does. That's the fun.

2:05 · Setting up the night

2:06Host B Setup takes about five minutes. The game master makes a group, and sends one invite link.

2:12Host B Everyone joins with an email code. No password.

2:16Host A I hate passwords.

2:17Host B Same.

2:19Host B Then the GM opens a session, picks the case, and seats everybody.

2:24Host B Ada and Bea are detectives. Mara is the Glazier. Ned is the Stone-Head Seller. And Sid just watches.

2:32Host A Wait, I'm Ada!

2:33Host B You're Ada.

2:34Host A And what does the Glazier do?

2:36Host B Only Mara knows. Her card says so.

2:39Host A Ooh.

2:40Host B Everyone joins the lobby, the GM marks ready, and begins. The game clock starts.

2:47Host A That's the whole setup?

2:48Host B That's it. Now the evidence drops.

2:50 · The first drop

2:51Host B The first drop is manual. The GM releases it when the table is ready.

2:56Host A Okay. Here it comes.

2:58Host B Everyone gets the first card. Tuesday, the wall is empty.

3:02Host B But the detectives also get a diagram, and a note about the glass case. Sid sees only the public card.

3:09Host A Why does Sid see less?

3:11Host B Spectators watch the newsreel. Detectives get the file.

3:15 · Asking for a card

3:16Host B Detectives don't just wait. They ask. Ada wants the glass from the case tested.

3:21Host A It's pretty clean, I'm hoping.

3:23Host B The request lands on the GM's screen. The GM can release the card, or say no.

3:29Host A So the GM is in charge of pacing.

3:32Host B Exactly. Release.

3:34Host B And here's the card. One clear thumbprint on the glass. A left thumb.

3:38Host A Great, so we match it!

3:40Host B Not so fast. The police files were sorted by right-hand prints.

3:45Host A So a left thumb just... sits there.

3:47Host B Nobody could search it.

3:48Host A That is maddening.

3:50 · Pinning the board

3:51Host B Now Ada pins the cards to the board. Timeline, people, places, or unknowns.

3:57Host A I'll pin the empty wall to the timeline, and write, Monday was closing day.

4:01Host B Bea sees it right away. Shared board, live.

4:04Host A And Sid?

4:06Host B Sid sees nothing. The board belongs to the detectives.

4:09 · Drops on the clock, and red herrings

4:10Host B Some drops come on the game clock. A frame on the stairs at eight minutes. Reward notices at fifteen.

4:18Host A So the clock does the dripping.

4:19Host B Timers drip the story. Your questions unlock the rest. For the video, we fired those timers early.

4:28Host B Bea asked about the stone heads, and got Apollinaire before the judge.

4:32Host A Apollinaire! Was he in on it?

4:34Host B Arrested in September. And Picasso was brought in too. The judge let both go.

4:41Host A So they were red herrings.

4:42Host B Great ones.

4:43 · The accusation

4:44Host B Time to accuse. Ada picks Vincenzo Peruggia, and cites three facts.

4:49Host B The left thumb. The glazier on the curators' list. And the man in the white smock.

4:55Host A I'm nervous.

4:56Host B Good. Bea locks it. After that, nobody changes it. Then the GM ends the session.

5:02 · The debrief: what really happened

5:03Host B And now the debrief. Everyone sees the same page, spectators too.

5:08Host A Peruggia is one of the people who did it. I got it!

5:11Host B You did. And this is what Mara had all night.

5:15Host B Here's what really happened. Vincenzo Peruggia, an Italian who'd worked at the Louvre, took it on the Monday.

5:22Host A Why?

5:23Host B He said he wanted it back in Italy.

5:25Host B Two years later, he offered it to a Florence dealer. The Uffizi's director looked at it, and Peruggia was arrested on the twelfth of December, 1913.

5:36Host A And the Louvre got it back?

5:37Host B In January 1914. Peruggia got one year and fifteen days, and served about seven months.

5:46Host A So the real thief was the guy who put the glass on it.

5:49Host B Accounts of how he got out differ. But yes.

5:53Host A And the con man from 1932?

5:56Host B Never confirmed. We left him on the list as a rumor, to see if you'd bite.

6:00Host A Sneaky.

6:01 · What the night showed

6:02Host B That's one full night. Setup, drops, asks, the board, an accusation, and a debrief.

6:08Host A I want to be Mara next time.

6:10Host B Sources and image credits are in the description. Every image is public domain.

6:15Host A See you at the next case.

0:00 · Cold open: two girls and a camera

0:00Host B July, 1917. Cottingley, a village in Yorkshire. Two cousins say they play with fairies at the stream at the bottom of the garden.

0:11Host A Fairies.

0:11Host B Elsie is sixteen. Frances is nine. Elsie borrows her father's camera, to prove it.

0:18Host A And?

0:19Host B Half an hour later, they come back. Triumphant.

0:22Host B The plate shows Frances behind a bush, with four little winged figures dancing in front of her.

0:28Host A Hold on. Real fairies?

0:30Host B Three years later, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle says yes.

0:34Host A The Sherlock Holmes guy?

0:36Host B The very same. And it takes sixty-six years for the cousins to say how they did it.

0:42Host A Okay, I'm in. But we're not just telling the story, are we?

0:46Host B Nope. Today we play it. A whole game night, start to finish.

0:50Host A And I've still never played.

0:51Host B Perfect. You're a detective tonight.

0:54 · How an Interrogation night works

0:55Host B Quick version. Interrogation is a mystery game for your own group.

1:00Host B One person runs the night. Detectives read and ask. One player is secretly the perpetrator, and some are suspects. Everyone else watches.

1:10Host A And the case is real?

1:12Host B Real history, adapted for play. The facts are public. We just turn them into evidence cards.

1:18Host A Adapted for play. Got it.

1:20Host B And every screen in a phone frame today is the real app. No mockups.

1:25 · The 1917 case file

1:26Host B Here's the case file. Summer, 1917. The village of Cottingley, near Bradford, in West Yorkshire.

1:33Host B Two photographs that year. Three more in August, 1920. That Christmas, Doyle puts them in The Strand magazine, and they sell out in days.

1:44Host A And nobody got hurt?

1:46Host B Nobody. No crime scene, no victim. Just one question. Who made the fairies, and how?

1:52Host A Well, surely it's the girls.

1:54Host B Hold that thought. In 1920, a lot of very clever people held the opposite one.

2:00Host A So who did it?

2:01Host B That's the game.

2:03Host B Five names go on the suspect list. The two cousins, Elsie Wright and Frances Griffiths.

2:09Host B Elsie's father, Arthur Wright, who developed the plates. Edward Gardner, a lecturer who championed the pictures.

2:16Host B And Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

2:18Host A Doyle? The Doyle?

2:20Host B He wrote the article that made them famous.

2:22Host A Okay, I already suspect the man who really wanted fairies to be real.

2:26Host B Everybody does. That's the fun.

2:29 · Setting up the night

2:30Host B Setup takes about five minutes. The game master makes a group, and sends one invite link.

2:36Host B Everyone joins with an email code. No password.

2:39Host A I hate passwords.

2:41Host B Same.

2:42Host B Then the GM opens a session, picks the case, and seats everybody.

2:47Host B Ada and Bea are detectives. Mara is the Cousin. Ned is the Lecturer. And Sid just watches.

2:55Host A Wait, I'm Ada!

2:56Host B You're Ada.

2:57Host A And what does the Cousin do?

2:59Host B Only Mara knows. Her card says so.

3:02Host A Ooh.

3:03Host B Everyone joins the lobby, the GM marks ready, and begins. The game clock starts.

3:10Host A That's the whole setup?

3:11Host B That's it. Now the evidence drops.

3:13 · The first drop

3:14Host B The first drop is manual. The GM releases it when the table is ready.

3:19Host A Okay. Here it comes.

3:21Host B Everyone gets the first card. Summer, 1917. Two photographs.

3:26Host B But the detectives also get a diagram of the garden and the beck, and a note about the camera. Sid sees only the public card.

3:35Host A Why does Sid see less?

3:37Host B Spectators watch the newsreel. Detectives get the file.

3:41 · Asking for cards

3:42Host B Detectives don't just wait. They ask. Ada wants to see the original glass plates.

3:47Host A I'm hoping an expert says they're fakes.

3:50Host B The request lands on the GM's screen. The GM can release the card, or say no.

3:56Host A So the GM is in charge of pacing.

3:58Host B Exactly. Release.

4:01Host B And here's the card. A photography expert, Harold Snelling, looked at the negatives in 1920.

4:08Host B He found them genuine, unfaked, single exposures. No trace whatsoever of studio work.

4:15Host A So no trick!

4:16Host B Read it again. Studio work.

4:18Host A Oh. They weren't in a studio.

4:20Host B Nobody tested paper cutouts, outdoors.

4:23Host A That is a very careful sentence.

4:26Host B Bea asks about the camera, and gets Arthur Wright's statement.

4:30Host B He developed the plate himself. He took the figures for cardboard cutouts. He even searched the girls' bedroom and the beck.

4:38Host A And?

4:38Host B Found nothing. He called it a prank, and wouldn't lend them the camera again.

4:43Host A So he cleared them?

4:44Host B He found nothing. That's different.

4:47Host B Now Ada checks the girls' bedroom. And this card is adapted for play.

4:52Host A Adapted how?

4:53Host B In 1920, nobody looked at the bookshelf. In the game, you can.

4:58Host B Princess Mary's Gift Book. A Christmas book from the first winter of the war, with a drawing of dancing fairies by Claude Shepperson.

5:08Host A Those poses look familiar.

5:09Host B Put them side by side, and decide.

5:13Host B Last ask. Ada wants to know about Mr Gardner's visit.

5:17Host B July, 1920. He brings two cameras and twenty-four secretly marked glass plates to Cottingley.

5:25Host A That sounds like a real test.

5:27Host B The girls say the fairies won't show if anyone's watching. So Elsie's mother goes to her sister's for tea.

5:33Host A And the girls are left alone.

5:35Host B Alone. In August, they take three more photographs.

5:39Host A The marks prove the plates are his. They don't prove what was in front of the camera.

5:43Host B You're getting good at this.

5:44 · Pinning the board

5:45Host B Now Ada pins the cards to the board. Timeline, people, places, or unknowns.

5:51Host A I'll pin the two photographs to the timeline, and write, summer 1917, one season.

5:57Host B Bea sees it right away. Shared board, live.

6:00Host A And Sid?

6:01Host B Sid sees nothing. The board belongs to the detectives.

6:05 · Drops on the clock, and red herrings

6:06Host B Some drops come on the game clock. The first print at eight minutes. The lecture on fairy life at fifteen. Christmas, 1920, at twenty-five.

6:17Host A So the clock does the dripping.

6:19Host B Timers drip the story. Your questions unlock the rest. For the video, we fired those timers early.

6:27Host B Bea asked who could have posed as fairies, and got Sir Oliver Lodge.

6:31Host A A scientist?

6:33Host B A physicist. He thought the pictures were fake, and suggested dancers dressed up as fairies. He also doubted the very Parisian hairstyles.

6:42Host A Were there dancers?

6:44Host B No dancers were ever named.

6:46Host A So that's a red herring. What about Gardner and Doyle?

6:49Host B They believed. Believing is not evidence.

6:52 · The accusation

6:52Host B Time to accuse. Ada picks Elsie Wright, and cites four facts.

6:57Host B Elsie could draw, and had worked in a photographer's studio. The fairies look like drawings in Princess Mary's Gift Book.

7:05Host B The girls only took pictures when alone. And the expert ruled out studio tricks, not outdoor cutouts.

7:13Host A I'm nervous.

7:14Host B Good. Bea locks it. After that, nobody changes it. Then the GM ends the session.

7:20 · The debrief: what really happened

7:21Host B And now the debrief. Everyone sees the same page, spectators too.

7:26Host A Elsie is one of the people who did it. I got it!

7:29Host B You did. And this is what Mara had all night.

7:33Host B Here's what really happened. In 1983, the cousins admit it in a magazine, The Unexplained. The photographs were faked.

7:43Host A How?

7:44Host B Elsie copied Shepperson's dancing fairies from Princess Mary's Gift Book, and added wings. They cut the figures out of cardboard.

7:52Host B Then they held them up with hatpins, and threw the props in the beck.

7:56Host A Hatpins. That's wonderfully low tech.

7:59Host B And both maintained they really had seen fairies.

8:02Host A What about the fifth photograph?

8:03Host B Accounts differ. Elsie said it was faked. Frances said it was genuine.

8:08Host B Photography expert Geoffrey Crawley suggested an accidental double exposure of cutouts in the grass, so both could be sincere.

8:18Host A And poor Conan Doyle?

8:20Host B He published The Coming of the Fairies in 1922, and died in 1930. The cousins didn't admit anything until 1983, fifty-three years after he'd gone.

8:33Host A Oh. So he never knew.

8:34Host B No. The cameras are in a museum in Bradford now.

8:38 · What the night showed

8:38Host B That's one full night. Setup, drops, asks, the board, an accusation, and a debrief.

8:45Host A I want to be Mara next time.

8:47Host B Sources and image credits are in the description, along with the licence notes for the photographs.

8:53Host A See you at the next case.