It’s Time to Finally Release the ‘Butler Did It’ Cut of Clue

Photo: Paramount/Everett Collection

But here’s what really happened: The makers of Clue, one of Tim Curry’s most beloved films, shot a fourth ending to the mystery spoof. According to the documentarians behind Who Done It: The Clue Documentary, it showed the butler Wadsworth (Curry) as having committed the murders. He tries to escape but is apprehended by the law. In the wake of Curry’s death, the Who Done It crew are begging Paramount to trawl its vaults and release the cut.

For those who haven’t seen the only good movie based on a board game (sorry, Battleship), Clue has multiple endings in order to simulate the repeatability of the game. Who killed Mr. Boddy (Fear singer Lee Ving)? At first the killer is revealed to be Miss Scarlet (Lesley Ann Warren), and Wadsworth outs himself as FBI. Mrs. Peacock is assigned blame in the second ending, with Wadsworth again a feeb. In the third and final ending, everyone killed at least one person and guilt can be passed around like rolls at Thanksgiving. Wadsworth is revealed to be the real Mr. Boddy, who is then shot by Mr. Green (Christopher Lloyd). Presumably the fourth ending was scrapped because going back to one killer feels like a bit of an anticlimax after the “everybody killed everybody” madness of ending No. 3. Nevertheless, any additional Tim Curry footage is a boon to the world. We probably should have had a camera on him at most times. That way, we’d have a pro-shot of the Curry–Ian McKellen original stage production of Amadeus.