The Mousetrap celebrates 60 years on stage – in pictures

Richard Attenborough and his wife Sheila Sim played the leads in the original Mousetrap at the Ambassadors theatre, where it ran for 21 years
Photograph: Rex Features

Agatha Christie and Peter Saunders cut the cake – which weighed half a ton – at The Mousetrap's 10th birthday celebration Photograph: PR

Richard Attenborough (right) and John Mills present Agatha Christie with a mousetrap in 1958 Photograph: Bentley Archive/Popperfoto/Getty Images

Exterior of St Martin's theatre, London, where The Mousetrap has been showing since March 1974 Photograph: PR

Richard Keightley as Christopher Wren, Jan Waters as Mrs Boyle and Barry Aird as Major Metcalf Photograph: PR

Marcel Bruneau as Detective-Sergeant Trotter and Lottie Latham as Miss Casewell in The Mousetrap's 2012 cast Photograph: PR

A blue plaque outside St Martin's theatre marks The Mousetrap's 50th anniversary Photograph: Frantzesco Kangaris

Andrew Bone, who plays Major Metcalf, says of the elderly production: 'With a Thursday, Friday, Saturday audience that are up for it, you don't hear the play creaking and it can really take off. When you get a quieter audience, you can hear it creak'
Photograph: Frantzesco Kangaris

Michael Fenner, who plays the character Mr Paravicini, eats his dinner backstage shortly before a performance
Photograph: Frantzesco Kangaris

Toby W Davies, who currently plays the character of Giles Ralston, warms up
Photograph: Frantzesco Kangaris

Current cast members Toby W Davies (centre), Natasha Rickman as Miss Casewell (foreground) and Zara Plessard as Mollie Ralston gear up for a performance
Photograph: Frantzesco Kangaris

St Martin's theatre lights up to celebrate The Mousetrap's diamond anniversary
Photograph: Frantzesco Kangaris

The woman who began it all … crime writer Agatha Christie, 1890-1976 Photograph: Bentley Archive/Popperfoto/Getty Images