We Read: 'The Murder of Roger Ackroyd' with the Westport Country Playhouse

From Page to Stage...

What if your book club came with a backstage pass?

To celebrate the 100th anniversary of Agatha Christie's The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, The Westport Library and Westport Country Playhouse are inviting readers on a one-of-a-kind journey from page to stage. Pick up Mark Shanahan's theatrical adaptation of this classic murder mystery, read and discuss the script with your fellow theater lovers (and the playwright himself!), then watch it come to life on the stage.

Because at The Westport Library, We Read not just to finish stories — but to experience them together.

Copies of the script will be available to borrow at the patron services desk on the main level. Grab yours today and meet us in Room 210 for a one-of-a-kind book club!

If you're participating in our 2026 Summer Reading Challenge, this book fulfills the following categories:

• A book that has a Westport connection
• A book about mistaken identity
• A book about a birth or a death
• A book that refers to another book
• A book about someone on the run
• A book with a totally unhinged character

Click here for more information on all 25 categories!

About the Playwright

This summer, Westport Country Playhouse Artistic Director Mark Shanahan will direct the final production in the Playhouse’s 2025-26 Season — his own adaptation of Agatha Christie’s The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, in partnership with Agatha Christie Ltd. During the Playhouse’s 2024-25 season, he directed The 39 Steps, as well as Theatre People.  For three consecutive seasons, he has directed his adaptation of the family holiday favorite, A Sherlock Carol, on the Playhouse stage.

He is the author of A Merry Little Christmas Carol, See Monsters of the Deep, the Off-Broadway and regional hit comedy The Dingdong, as well as numerous radio plays as creator of the White Heron Ghost Light series, featuring Christopher Plummer, Judith Ivey, Rhonda Ross, and other notables. Shanahan has directed at stages around the country such as Alley Theatre, George Street Playhouse, Virginia Stage, Arkansas Rep, White Heron, Mile Square Theatre, Hudson Stage, Theatre Squared, Fulton Opera House, Weston Playhouse, Orlando Shakespeare Festival, Florida Rep, Penguin Rep, Merrimack Rep, The Cape Playhouse, and many more.

As an actor, Shanahan has appeared on and Off-Broadway (The 39 Steps, Tryst, The Shaugraun, and others) and at many celebrated regional theatres. Shanahan has appeared on the Westport Country Playhouse stage in Journey’s End (2005), David Copperfield, directed by Joanne Woodward and Annie Keefe, (2005), Sedition (2007), Tryst (2008), and Around the World in 80 Days (2009), and numerous Script In Hand readings. He is also curator of the Playhouse’s Script in Hand playreading series, as well as the creator and curator of Westport Country Playhouse Radio Theater, in partnership with WSHU Public Radio.