The Mystery of Edwin Drood @ the Roundabout

The musical The Mystery of Edwin Drood is based on Charles Dickens' last novel.  Dickens passed away before completing this work.  Posthumously, his novel has been turned into this awful musical mess. This charmless & droll musical begins before the curtain rises.  Characters from the play move through the audience in costume striking up conversations.  A member of the audience is brought on stage for the opening musical number which appeals to out-of-towners but appears buffoonish for New Yorkers. The gimmick of a play within a play grew wearisome along with the trite inside squabbles amongst the cast. The show is an awful mishmash of vaudeville, farce, droll puns, poor Gilbert & Sullivan immitation & ludicrous humor.  All of which the audience found amusing.  Therein lies the Mystery; what if anything was redeeming?  Chita Rivera was everybit the Broadway star in an otherwise Broaway flop.  At inermission,  my NYC friends said tally ho.  But I endured the beginning of Act II where the device for solving the Mystery was put forth for audition participation.  Alas, I could bear it no more & shot out the door.  This play may fly with the tourists, but for discerning NYC theatre patrons, bah humbug.