The characters in “Murder on the Orient Express” were brilliantly casted and all mendied very well together. All the characters were a piece in a puzzle and the actors used their skills to show that to the audience. Caption by. Izabella Zadra Photo from The Duluth Playhouse.

The Duluth Playhouse is putting on its production of Agatha Christie's classic, “Murder on the Orient Express” at the NorShor Theater and it is not a show you should miss. For me, this was the first show that I have ever seen put on by the Playhouse at the NorShor, and every aspect of it was a fabulous experience.

Starting off, not even about the show, I really liked the vibe of the NorShor! I thought it was just big enough, but there wasn’t an overwhelming amount of people like other shows you’d see at the D.E.C.C or in the cities. This was also a bonus when it came to intermission where you typically have to fist-fight your way to the bathroom.

Bringing it all back to the show itself, the NorShor was a perfect venue to host this type of production. With the whole plot taking place on a train, having a smaller stage with a more tight-knit set helped bring the audience onto that train and into that scene.

The set design in creating the train was simplistic but effective. Designers created the outside of the train that stayed the same in every scene but was filled with different floor sets that depicted different areas on the train. At the end of the day, it was just a cool design choice from the set crew and a smart way to create that setting.

Overall visually, the show gave me a high school theater kind of vibe due to some of the set design and costumes being a little hokey and cheesy looking…but I don’t think that has to be a bad thing. That is the magic of local theater so I am not complaining about it, just something that I did notice right off the bat.

Where credit is due is in the costumes and the interior set designs, which were accurate for the time. Now I know that’s the nerd in me, but it is important to be accurate in things like that because those small touches are the ones that transport the audience to the timeframe of the story. Some eras are similar style-wise, but a woman from the '60s wouldn’t have a '70s hairstyle — audience members notice those things so it is important to be as time-accurate as possible.

Although I dragged the quality of the costumes and sets (again, not a bad thing), I thought special effect-wise, everything looked great and was executed well. The one scene that sticks out the most is towards the end where there are depictions of flashbacks. Because we are in a theater watching a show on the stage, we won’t get an instant replay like a film would give us so there needs to be some critical thinking and creativity — this show used spotlights to hit the character's faces as they repeated lines from the flashback scenes. It was smooth and a smart way of creating these flashbacks not only to remind the audience but for a sense of dramatic effect.

The overall plot of “Murder on the Orient Express” blew my mind! Without giving the show away, the twists and turns the audience was taken on were fun, mysterious and wonderful. This story wouldn’t have been able to come alive though if it was not for the cast of actors.

It has been a while since I have seen a show as well cast as this one ended up being — every character was perfectly cast and brought their heart to the stage. Christie created such a wide range of characters who all had their little quirks and every actor was able to embody that.

The one thing that stood out the most for the cast as a whole was how well they were all able to keep up with their character's accents. In this story, we have multiple people from all over the world such as America, Belgium, Russia, Scotland and so on which leads to a large array of different accents. All the actors were able to keep their accents consistent and on point throughout the show which was another detail that pulled the audience onto the Orient Express.

I did notice that there were a few jokes and lines that didn’t land quite right and were not delivered in the right way, but it was impressive to see how the actors adapted to the fault. They kept on going, almost making the mistake seem in character for their role and that maybe the character didn’t understand what they were saying, or were too nervous and rushed to deliver a dramatic line. This is something I don’t see a lot in most of the shows I go to — a slip-up is very clumsy — taking the actor a second to get back into their character, so I was pleasantly surprised by the quickness of the cast.

Christa Schulz (Helen Hubbard) was a highlight simply because of how she played the part of a person that we all know. Helen was the Minnesotan character and hit every nail on the head — she was nosy, loud, judgemental, goofy, bossy and a little crude, though it was never to your face. As annoying as the character was, you were almost waiting for her to come back out on stage to put in her two cents and bring some comic relief.

Out of everyone in the cast though, I fell in LOVE with Michael Kraklio (Monsieur Bouc) — he might be the cutest man I have ever seen in my whole life! If Jack Black and a teddy bear were morphed together…we would have Kraklio! I just wanted to put him in my pocket, he was so adorable and was able to bring that into his character of Monsieur Bouc who I was also just mesmerized with.

Michael Kraklio working his magic with co-star Mike Pederson who played the role of Hercule Poirot. Caption by. Izabella Zadra. Photo from the Duluth Playhouse.

Overall, I thought this was a well-thought-out and brilliant adaptation of Agatha Christie’s “Murder on the Orient Express.” I think the Playhouse is the epitome of local theater and that is what gives their shows so much charm. “Murder on the Orient Express” is running until Feb. 11 and is currently completely sold out. Continue to check the Duluth Playhouse’s website for updates on added tickets, added shows and future productions.

Murder on the Orient Express Review