OAKBROOK TERRACE, Ill.—When Agatha Christie’s first novel was accepted by a publisher, he signed her to an exploitive five-novel deal for a pittance. The publisher believed that Christie was good for only a few books and thought after the five-book deal nothing would be heard from her again. It was the biggest publishing mistake in history because the crime writer went on to write 66 mystery novels and 14 collections of short stories making her the most popular and money-making author of all time (outsold only by the Bible and Shakespeare).
Among those works, one of the best loved is “Murder on the Orient Express,” which is why so many films have been made of it. With that whodunit produced in so many forms, and with so many knowing its ending, is it possible to make a theatrical production of it worthwhile? The answer is a resounding yes, with the triumphant production of it now playing at the Drury Lane Theatre in Oakbrook, Illinois….