There’s a Wild Fourth Ending to CLUE Where Tim Curry Kills Everyone and We’ll Never See It
Long before Hollywood tried steering board games into blockbuster territory, the 1985 mystery comedy Clue proved the concept could actually work. Based on the classic board game, the film delivered a chaotic, rapid-fire whodunnit packed with killer performances and an ingenious twist of multiple endings.
Tim Curry recently brought up the fact again during an interview with The Academy that there was a fourth ending that was shot and almost made it into the film.
Adapting a board game about suspects, weapons, and rooms inside a mansion doesn’t exactly scream cinematic gold. But the setup is practically built for a murder mystery, and it was a ton of fun.
A corpse, a house full of secrets, and a colorful lineup of potential killers? That’s prime material. You could imagine it playing out like an Death on the Nile or Murder on the Orient Express style mystery, something straight out of an Agatha Christie novel.
Instead, director Jonathan Lynn, who crafted the story with John Landis, took a sharp left turn. Rather than playing it straight, Clue leaned hard into absurdity and black comedy. The mansion setting remained faithful to the board game, but the tone was gleefully chaotic.
A group of strangers, each hiding a scandal, are summoned to dinner by Mr. Boddy, played by Lee Ving, and greeted by the relentlessly energetic butler Wadsworth, played by Tim Curry.
The guest list includes Madeline Kahn, Martin Mull, Christopher Lloyd, Lesley Ann Warren, Eileen Brennan, and Michael McKean, all embodying the familiar characters fans knew from the game.
When Mr. Boddy winds up dead, the evening spirals into a madcap mess of blackmail, suspicion, and increasingly ridiculous twists. Every character has motive. Every character has secrets, and Curry tears through the film at full speed, commanding the chaos like a maestro conducting a symphony of panic.
Then came the film’s most infamous gamble. Instead of wrapping up with one tidy solution, Clue offered three different endings. Audiences in 1985 didn’t even see the same conclusion depending on which theater they attended.
The segments, titled “How it Could Have Happened,” “How About This?,” and “Here’s What Really Happened,” each reveal different killers and motives. It was a wild move that fans loved.
But there was another ending filmed that never made it to audiences. A fourth.
Lynn and Curry previously talked about it, and it would have completely changed the tone of the film. In this version, Wadsworth snaps and murders everyone himself. Curry recalled the scene bluntly: "I ran around the house killing everybody."
Lynn ultimately decided it didn’t belong. He explained, “It wasn’t funny enough. It wasn’t surprising enough. It ended the film on an anti-climax. So I just took it out. Three was enough.”
Curry recently shared that this ending was “his favorite.”
The three endings we got are tightly wound, absurdly funny, and endlessly rewatchable. They’re part of what cemented Clue as a cult comedy classic. A version where Wadsworth simply eliminates the entire cast might have been shocking, but shock alone doesn’t guarantee laughs.
Still, the idea of Curry sprinting through the mansion, knocking off every suspect in sight, is undeniably hilarious to picture. It’s one of those lost movie scenes that fans will always be curious about and would love to see.