Clive Barnes of The New York Times dubbed The Real Inspector Hound "a perfect joy. Intellectually stimulating and civilized to just short of a fault, [...] The results are hilarious enough, but the froth leaves an oddly provocative aftertaste."[3] Todd Everett of Los Angeles Times billed it as "a timeless farce" in 1992.[4] A Chicago Reader reviewer wrote in 2010 that Stoppard's script "[opens] out beyond satire to express the strange elation, identification, and even erotic fascination any audience member can feel in the dark."[5] The Telegraph's Charles Spencer said that The Real Inspector Hound "brilliantly nails the clichés of the reviewer's craft and the bitter jealousies of this grubby profession". Spencer said the play "[sends] up hackneyed thrillers and terrible acting with a winning mixture of sly humour and palpable affection."[6]
The Guardian's Michael Billington wrote that "Stoppard pins down perfectly the critical tendency towards lofty pronouncements [...] Stoppard also plays brilliantly on the spectator's secret desire to enter the house of illusion", praising the scene when Birdboot crosses the footlights. The critic joked, "If I weren't so scared of sounding like the pretentious Moon, I'd say Stoppard's play is a minor comic masterpiece about the theatrical process."[7] Celia Wren of The Washington Post called it "a brilliant parody" with a "delectably language-drunk, hall-of-mirrors world."[8] In 2012, Anna Lively of The Cambridge Student said that the work "has all the wit and originality that we expect from Tom Stoppard’s plays. [...] it subverts the familiarity of the murder mystery into a satisfyingly complex metatheatrical comedy."[9]
The Tab's Jamie P. Robson dubbed The Real Inspector Hound "an intricate pleasure [...] Myriad elements of the job are fantastically satirised: the bombast, the pretentiousness, the over-intellectual analyses". Robson argued that it "escalates into chaotic brilliance [...] when the critics step through the fourth wall [...] the unstoppable progress of the play-within-the-play to its twist-filled ending is as hilarious as it is magnetic."[10] In 2016, Kate Wingfield of Metro Weekly dubbed it "very fun to be with", writing that "it is Moon’s bafflement that carries the humor and the tenor of Stoppard’s grand design."[11]
BroadwayWorld's Nancy Grossman wrote that "even in this genre, Stoppard finds ways to be clever, inventive, and, at times confounding."[12] Dominic P. Papatola of St. Paul Pioneer Press described Stoppard's story as "toothsome and involved".[13] In 2018, Jonah Dunch of The Gateway called it a "comedic tour de force", praising "Stoppard’s erudite writing and clever plot".[14] In the Daily Herald, Barbara Vitello described the play as "[well]-crafted with the trademark wordplay for which the brainy British writer is known".[15] The Guadalajara Reporter staff wrote, "A classic of the English comic tradition, this play weaves together parody, pastiche and punning to create a wonderfully entertaining and ingenious one-act comedy."[16] Zoe Paskett of Evening Standard listed it as one of Stoppard's five finest works (the others being Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, Travesties, The Real Thing, and Arcadia).[17]
Conversely, Jan Herman stated in a 1991 review for Los Angeles Times that The Real Inspector Hound "is little more than a mannered cuckoo clock of a comedy". Deriding the script as "overdone", Herman argued, "What humor [Stoppard's allusions] still have depends less on recognition of the particular details he has borrowed from Christie’s play than on a more general idea of the traditional conventions of the well-made thriller."[18] Jess M. Bravin of The Harvard Crimson judged the character development and story to be less impressive than the dialogue, and criticized the way that a 1987 Dunster House production "ponderously [followed] every twist in the script."[19] Kay Kipling of Sarasota Magazine called the play "clever" but stated that "I found Hound wearing out its welcome just about five minutes before it actually came to an end. Maybe there’s only so much laughter one can take before tiring."[20]
