SYNOPSIS

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Passengers aboard the opulent Orient Express awake to frightful news: Overnight, the American business mogul among them was stabbed to death behind locked doors. Thankfully, debonair detective Hercule Poirot is on the train and on the case. He promptly begins interviewing suspects, securing alibis and forming theories about the killer, who remains at large and could be closing in on the next victim. As the plot thickens and the travelers grow restless, Poirot presents two viable scenarios about who murdered the mogul and why, taking the audience on a wildly glamorous crime-solving ride.

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Three things to know

• Agatha Christie’s famous novel is a meditation on revenge and justice. Ken Ludwig’s adaptation for the stage streamlines the plot (inspired by the kidnapping of the Lindbergh baby) and the number of characters, but it keeps the mystery and famous-if-you-know-it ending.

• Poirot tells the audience that this story of primal murder is an “odyssey of deception and trickery” that proved to be the greatest case of his career.

• Ludwig wrote this adaptation of Murder on the Orient Express at the request of the Agatha Christie Estate, and it premiered at McCarter Theatre Center in 2017.

From the Guthrie Theater