The entertaining and surprisingly enlightening play opens TheatreWorks Silicon Valley's 53rd season.
Parsing Agatha Christie’s existence in her home country of England 100 years ago is an obsession for those who buy tickets to the annual Festival in her honor, an event for glimmering tea sippers displaying earnest pinky-up energy.
For an extra fee, one can opt into the deluxe “Murder on the Orient Express Package,” in which folks consumed with the prolific detective writer can snap snaps and instantly Instagram with the deliciously crafted, mustachioed confections of Hercule Poirot. Christie’s greatness, and an infinite amount of peas, are on full display here, the denizens of docents flexing their Christie bona fides incessantly.
Yet there is one taboo topic amongst even those who can recite “The Mousetrap” at warp speed — the famed writer’s 11-day disappearance in 1926. In “Mrs. Christie,” now playing in Mountain View, one of these superfans is the gumshoe-obsessed Lucy, consumed with all things Christie. Her presence at the author’s hallowed grounds attempts to clarify some loose ends about the mysterious vanishing, believed to be informed by the author’s marital breakdown and mother’s death. What Lucy doesn’t fully account for is the deep connection that seems to exist between her and Christie, with both of their lives awash in chaos borne from cavernous consequences.
“Mrs. Christie,” which is kicking off TheatreWorks Silicon Valley’s 53rd season, is a gargantuan, mysterious delight, a swimmingly satisfying soirée awash in colorful characters that juxtapose mightily with Christie icons such as Poirot and Miss Jane Marple.
That’s despite the show’s weighty exposition, which makes the narrative somewhat convoluted, especially in the scene-setting first act. A sleek tightening would lend itself well to the memorable characters playwright Heidi Armbruster has crafted. Her highly intelligent piece is slathered with a scrumptiously searing cast of Bay Area theater all stars, a group that carries the highly comical storyline to dizzying heights, stewarded deftly by the sure-handed direction of TheatreWorks artistic director Giovanna Sardelli.
Agatha Christie (Jennifer Le Blanc) may be a glittering savant when it comes to her authorship, but when dealing with the world outside her characters, she is pure disaster. What does not help is the chilly relationship with her golf-loving husband Archie (Aldo Billingslea), a man blatantly having an affair with the lovely Nancy Neele (Kina Kantor), leading to a hilarious recitation of her name from Agatha.
Things get really wild about a century later, when the scalding hot mess that is Lucy (Nicole Javier) stages an all-out ambush into the house’s most forbidden corners. While the discovery of a critical manuscript is provided by William (Max Tachis) as a ploy to score with all the ladies looking for some extra Christie panache, others are happy to encourage Lucy to stay the course and dig into the disappearance’s truth, especially Mrs.- Marple-incarnate herself Jane (Lucinda Hitchcok Cone). Yet, as the codes are about to be broken, It is Lucy who discovers how alike she and her heroine are.
Where the play finds its groove is in its freneticism. Sardelli’s quick-paced staging, and the velvety-smooth flow she incorporates, is informed mightily by Christopher Fitzer’s wholly satisfying scenic design, complete with books resting atop a set that never sits still for very long.
The defining feature of “Mrs. Christie” is the radiant, highly stylized performances from the cast of eight. As the title character, Le Blanc is magnificent as she enters and exits each kerfuffle with rue. Her work with others transcends the space, especially when it comes to Billingslea’s Archie, a dapper chap reeking of smarm. Javier is a storm of energy and empathy, a whirling dervish who constructs her arc with oodles of discovery. William Thomas Hodgson’s hilarious detective, Le Detective, lurks in corners until he strikes with a new detail, aided by his gut-busting Belgian accent and face that morphs endlessly.
Despite the play’s obvious ode to comedy of manners, albeit with a sharper sting, it’s the power of discovery that lends itself well to Armbruster’s slick penning. The piece is not just a laugh-fest, but brings up some critical truths about how a woman’s past need not inform her present, a denouement that pushes to the brink of sentimentality but brilliantly stops just short.
Christie, despite some horrendous stretches of awful luck, didn’t let her worst define her. It’s a credit that “Death on the Nile” is more memorable than her disappearance. And if Christie has the knowledge to move Lucy towards a life of strength and empowerment, Lucy’s second act will certainly be filled with joy as wide as her muse’s anthology.
David John Chávez is chair of the American Theatre Critics Association and a two-time juror for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama (‘22-‘23); @davidjchavez.
By Heidi Armbruster, presented by TheatreWorks Silicon Valley
Through: Oct. 29
Where: Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts, 500 Castro St., Mountain View
Running time: 2 hours, one intermission
Tickets: $27-$82; theatreworks.org
