Agatha Christie’s ‘Orient Express’ steams into Sanford with murderous style
Nearly 50 years after her death, Agatha Christie is still making theater headlines. Her whodunit “The Mousetrap” — the world’s longest-running play — just celebrated 70 years in London with the announcement that it would finally get a Broadway production later this year.
Onstage at the Ritz Theater in Sanford is a newish adaptation of one of Christie’s bestknown novels, “Murder on the Orient Express.” I say newish, because prolific playwright Ken Ludwig’s adaptation actually debuted in 2017, but the COVID19 pandemic means it’s still relatively unseen.
Director Douglas Carey clearly has an affinity for the Queen of Crime — this is the fifth Christie play he has directed — and his care with the material shows in the Ritz’s presentation, which plays out on a handsome set.
True, some of the pitfalls of community theater make unwelcome appearances: The sound quality isn’t always the best in the Ritz, and on opening night, cues and actors’ lines often felt like they came a split second too late, especially as the show moved toward its denouement when you want the tension to really ramp up.
But on the whole, “Murder on the Orient Express” has a lot going for it — starting with Ludwig’s adaptation, which is faithful to the original story of a snowbound train with a murderer on board, but deepens Christie’s plot with a musing on the nature of justice and the importance of order.
It’s 1934 and Hercule Poirot, Christie’s famed Belgian detective, is in Istanbul. At a restaurant he overhears curious conversations among strangers — and then re-encounters them aboard the luxurious Orient Express. He also encounters Samuel Ratchett, an off-putting American who wants Poirot to “snoop around” and find out who has been threatening him.
Poirot declines. There’s a scream in the night. And then one unlucky passenger turns up dead.
Carey takes a creative approach with a sort of prologue: In darkness, the Ritz audience listens to a crime being committed, a crime that looms large over the mystery to come. And he does fine work in balancing the humor in Ludwig’s script against the darkness of the crimes being discussed.
Ludwig, known for his farces, has added a lot of humor to what is really a grim story — and it works.
Sue Jordan as a much-married American from Minnesota provides much of the humor; she has fun with her Midwest
accent and her character’s flirtatious garrulousness. Connor Nichols smartly doesn’t overplay his put-upon secretary role, but also shines in a moment where the audience sees his fire. And Roy Harlin — thanks in part to costume designer Chris Gagliardi and dialect coach Lori Engler — does outstanding work in distinguishing the two characters he plays; I didn’t even realize it was
the same actor until I checked the playbill at intermission.
But this, of course, is Hercule Poirot’s show. Adam Cornett plays the great sleuth a bit humbler than expected. That self-satisfied sheen of quiet superiority one associates with Poirot isn’t on view, but that makes Cornett’s version more human as he grapples with his conscience. Cornett nicely captures Poirot’s other qualities: His tenaciousness, his anger at liars and his frustration when justice is being thwarted.
Sabrena Allen-Bron has created a set that matches the swanky ideal of the Orient Express, although I wish the multiple scene changes Ludwig insists on happened a tad more quickly.
There are other fine touches, too: The choice of classical incidental music that matches the tone, the lighting that highlights the suspects during flashbacks of key moments as Poirot explains how the crime was carried out.
Christie’s novel has been adapted multiple times, for television and more than one big-budget movie. The Ritz’s production shows that the stage version is a worthy addition to the canon.