I thoroughly enjoyed Agatha Christie’s Black Coffee – a fun production with a clever conceptual frame which provides the play with a chilling context, giving it resonance beyond its charm as entertaining theatre. Black Coffee at until April 26 and then transfers to April 30 to June 1, 2025 with the brilliant as a delicious Hercule Poirot.

It is a big show with a huge cast – 10 and sumptuous set by Sarah Roberts (production design). She has also designed the costumes and props. Terrific cast – , Mike Huff, Anne Williams, Brett Krüger, , , .

Young , a graduate (2021) plays Lucia Amory. I was fascinated by her gestures – eye rolls, grimaces. Watch her. in the director’s seat has spiked each protagonist with yummy accents, physical comedy, at times affirming and at other times, transcending archetype.  

I saw Committie recently at the 2025 Fleur du Cap Theatre Awards doing his shtick and here is as Poirot, the refugee Belgian detective. Committie doesn’t overdo the accent and does not make Poirot into a clown – just gets it right with inspired physical comedy moments. Zesty full bodied Italian accent by Michael Richards as Dr Carelli. The ensemble cast is terrific.

Chatting with Swerdlow, at interval, he marvelled about the prescience of Agatha Christie in plotting out this murder mystery which has its jump off point with Sir Claud Armory, a famous scientist. Sir Claud has brewed an atomic formula and is alarmed that it has been stolen. Murder and intrigue ensues and I am not going to reveal more than that.

Black Coffee was written in 1928 and as Swerdlow muses in his Director’s Note, Dame Agatha was on it, before atomic weapons became widely known. Swerdlow posits that it is possible that that Dame Christie may have attended public lectures, presented by Ernest Rutherford (Innovator atomic and nuclear physics, Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1908). Black Coffee- the first play that Christie wrote for the stage- premiered in 1930. For this staging, Swerdlow has set the action in 1938, prior to World War II. With war looming, there was considerable angst and trepidation around weapons and espionage (spies everywhere) and what was going to happen. The sumptuous set and costumes are very much pre-war, with everything in its place and “… echoes the golden end of the Edwardian Era just before the mud, trenches and deaths of the Great War obliterated it.”

Swerdlow in conversation added: “I wanted to highlight Christie’s remarkably prescient concern about nuclear weapons.  Also, the late 30s saw Britain awash with spies, as was Europe.  I think the general public [now- 2025] still has memories of the Oppenheimer movie.  I’ve found if you give the Christie plays some worth and treat them seriously, they work much better and the comedy is part of the whole and not imposed.” As to the Christie Estate, being okay with production choices, Swerdlow said: “The Christie estate is happy for professional companies to set the plays when they see fit. It’s part of the current worldwide revival of interest in Christie.  On YouTube right now is Travels with Agatha – David Suchet’s five part documentary about Christie’s travels to the colonies.  Episode 1 is about South Africa.”

I love the fabulously hideous gear worn by Dianne Simpson (Barbara Amory) and revolting fake flowers in the hair, English high society taste. I was intrigued by the props (Sarah Roberts) such as a Toby jug and other hideous English pottery. There are references to English pottery in the script, by the way. The Toby Jug with an eye patch is a character in its own right. Watch until the end.

Black Coffee is sheer entertainment and escapism, with a feel good nugget to take home. However, beyond the fun, mirth and mayhem, the production is layered with nuance, reverberating off the pre-war time and back to us – now- in 2025 – with all our trepidation and worries – of what is to unfold in this world of ours and ultimately the choices that we make as individuals. Go and see Black Coffee. It is fun, funny and with a fresh take on the murder mystery, by Alan Swerdlow.

✳ Agatha Christie’s Black Coffee, presented by Pieter Toerien Productions, March 19 – April 26, 2025 at Theatre on the Bay, Cape Town and Johannesburg, Pieter Toerien’s Montecasino Theatre April 30 – June 1, 2025. Pic: Claude Barnardo. Supplied.