The Murder of Roger Ackroyd

Westport Country PLayhouse

By: Karen Isaacs - Aug 02, 2026

 

Vacation almost made me miss the sparkling production of The Murder of Roger Ackroyd  at Westport Country Playhouse. I’m glad I was able to catch it during its final days.

Agatha Christie wrote convoluted murder mysteries that followed a pattern of too many suspects, too much hidden from the reader, and an implausible murderer.

But add a touch of humor, which playwright Mark Shanahan does, and you can turn most Christie novels into delightful theatrical entertainments.

Shanahan takes her novel The Murder of Roger Ackryod and makes it shine. The play first appeared at Westport’s Script in Hand series in 2023 and then went on a production at Houston’s Alley Theatre; other productions followed.

This 1926 novel which some consider Christie’s finest is the third in which the Belgium detective Hercule Poirot appears. (A running gag in this and other Poirot novels is that everyone says he is French much to his consternation and they all mangle his name.) To briefly summarize the story, in a small English village, the country doctor narrates the story which involves the murder of a wealthy resident, Roger Ackroyd just days after his fiancée, another wealthy resident, has died, possibly a suicide.

Of course, there a wealth of suspects staying in the house: his sister-in-law who needs his money (an extraordinary Karen Ziemba), her daughter who is supposedly engaged to Ackroyd’s ne’er-do-well stepson, the stern and efficient personal assistant, the stepson who is lurking in the village, the butler (of course), and others including a friend who depends on Ackroyd for monetary gifts. Poirot has moved to the village after supposedly retiring; Roger’s niece asks for his assistance.

Shanahan has directed this with a sure hand. He has also assembled a fine cast who mostly manage the English accents acceptably. It’s difficult not to mention everyone in the cast; however, for me, standouts were Ziemba as the greedy and desperate sister-in-law, John Rapson as the country doctor who narrates the play, Erin Noel Greenan as his gossipy sister, and Richard R. Henry as Ackroyd’s friend Major Blunt, and, of course, Anthony Cochrane as Poirot.

The production values are excellent. Charlie Corcoran has designed what we would expect of an English manner house, including clever ways to allow for different settings, Jeni Schaefer has created period costumes and wigs (Ziemba’s gowns were particularly impressive), with very good lighting by Julie Duro and original music and sound design by John Gromada.

I hope you saw this production which keeps you guessing until the very end. It ran through Saturday, Aug. 1.