One of Agatha Christie’s best loved stories, Murder on the Orient Express has been adapted to film, TV and even a graphic novel, and it is now embarking on a UK tour as a theatre adaptation starring Michael Maloney and Bob Barret, directed by the amazing Lucy Bailey, who has also brought Christie’s Witness for the Prosecution and And Then There Were None to the stage on tour around the country.
World-famous detective Hercule Poirot is returning to England after a difficult case in Istanbul when he meets an old friend, Monsieur Bouc, who finds him a berth in the first-class carriage on the Orient Express leaving that evening, despite it being mysteriously fully booked. But when a snowdrift stops the train, events rapidly spiral out of control….
The performance began with the stage empty and dark, but a combination of projection, audio and the sheer tangible personality of the actors meant that the audience were transported to a different world, with the small, intimate nature of the theatre adding to the intensity of the performance. The actors portrayed the fragile connections between fellow strangers, thrown together through circumstance, which became even more fascinating as the performance progressed and the transient nature of the set revealed itself, with carriages appearing to move around the actors even as they moved within them. The eponymous train is obviously not the easiest thing to recreate on stage, but I thought it was very impressive, shifting and rearranging as necessary to suit the scenes, to the extent that the set itself almost became an extra participant in the performance, as dynamic and unexpected as the characters themselves.
The best-selling novelist of all time, Agatha Christie was born in Torquay in 1890, and she taught herself to read during a childhood with little formal education due to the small number of children in Torquay at the time. She never originally intended to be a writer, but a challenge from her older sister Madge inspired the seeds of what would become The Mysterious Affair at Styles, the first introduction to a small, impeccably dressed Belgian called Hercule Poirot. He went on to appear in thirty-three novels and over fifty short stories, and is one of the few fictional characters to receive an obituary in the New York Times. Murder on the Orient Express was published in 1934, six years after Christie finally achieved her dream of travelling on the train; a trip during which she took detailed notes of the carriages, several of which became vital to her detective’s investigation. However, Poirot is often more interested in the psychological aspects of a case than the scientific, which, combined with the unusual nature of this particular case, gives rise to an intriguing ethical dilemma, forcing Poirot to reconsider his trust in the justice system.
Despite its dark nature, the performance regularly induced laughter across the audience, with the actors interacting in a way that was sometimes comedic and yet very convincing. I was sat next to the assistant director, Victoria Gartner, and after the performance, I asked her what it was like finally seeing the performance with an audience after being involved in the rehearsals. “I think it’s really interesting for us to see it with an audience,” she said, “because you never know; you really hope the jokes work, but everyone’s really scared. I think something that works so well are all the duos in the show, so the Bouc and Poirot duo and the Princess and Greta duo - people really love seeing those characters interacting with each other, so those are the bits that get the most laughs.”
The moments between Bouc (Bob Barret) and Poirot (Michael Maloney) were wonderful to watch, demonstrating the true depth of old friendships, and it was amazing to see the tangible presence that Poirot had on stage, particularly as the play opened with Maloney alone on the empty stage. Victoria continued, “Lucy Bailey [the Director] wanted to have this magical storytelling device where the stage starts, and it’s completely black, and then you see a chair, and then a table, and then five minutes later you have a massive train there and you don’t know how it appeared, and then at the end you have nothing again and you think ‘Wait, What?’ There’s something about this language that we’ve developed together that went with the design of the train, and with the video and with the sound and with the lighting, and all of these languages work together, I think both because the team is so brilliant, but also because Lucy's vision is so clear.”
This is a brilliant new retelling of the classic story, and there are slight changes to the original characters, but it still does justice to the tale told by Agatha Christie. There were nods to the David Suchet television series, as Poirot finished spotlighted on stage, but this production had more humour than the book or the films, contrasting beautifully with Poirot’s soliloquy, which held the audience in silent suspense. Whether you are familiar with the mystery or not, the chemistry of the actors on stage, imaginative set design and the captivating storytelling makes this enjoyable for all.
I would definitely recommend this amazing production, which should not be missed by Agatha Christie fans or mystery-loving theatre goers. Running in Richmond Theatre until the 9th November, the production is then on tour across the UK over the next six months, bringing this dark and well loved story to a new audience.
https://murderontheorientexpressplay.com/
