This episode was not my cup of tea. Only occasionally do I enjoy revenge curse stories and, even then, only when the curse is thrown by an innocent person who was wronged by someone greedy, crooked or evil (As in, say, The House of the Seven Gables---the novel by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Not the RMT version, which alters the original story.) At least there's a sense of justice involved. In Deadline for Death, our "protagonists" are both crooks, so I really can't find myself caring too much about how the curse plays out. Neither one of the characters drew my sympathy, and certainly not my respect.

Also, this play has kind of a one-note plot. I mean, from the beginning we already know the curse came true. It's being recounted by the two dead criminals. So the whole thing just becomes an end-game---listening to Sammy become more and more paranoid, tortured by Johnny's ghost, until we find out how he ended up dying. (SPOILER ALERT) The one interesting little twist comes at the end of the second act, when Sammy's girlfriend reveals that he's lost his mind and has no sense of how much time has passed. It foreshadows the idea that his own guilt-feelings kill him.

Despite the script, though, the acting and production values were good and the little plot twist mentioned above was interesting, so I give this one a 2.