Adapting Christie: An overview

(c) Agatha Christie Archive Trust 

There have been many different adaptations of Agatha Christie's stories on film and television over the last decade. Some have been successful, and some have not. 

Prior to the 1980s, Agatha Christie never allowed television or movie companies to adapt her work for the screen, as she had seen what they could do to her works. Take Margaret Rutherford, for example. Christie, although being great friends with Ms Rutherford, never made a secret of her dislike towards her portrayal as Miss Marple. But after Christie's death in 1976, her daughter was more open to letting TV companies film her mother's works. So in 1980, producer and writer Pat Sandys (mother to actress Samantha Bond) had permission to adapt to of Christie's novels: Why Didn't They Ask Evans and The Seven Dials Mystery. Both were successful adaptions because of one main reason: they were faithful to the source materials. These two television films created the birth of adaptions of Christie's work. There were already feature length movies starring Peter Ustinov on the big screen, but these television adaptions heralded a new age for Agatha Christie. Three years later, Pat Sandys filmed the ten part series Partners In Crime (1983-4) starring James Warwick and Francesca Annis as Tommy and Tuppence. Then, the next year, the BBC struck gold by starting a new series based on the Miss Marple series of novels, starring Joan Hickson as the sleuth. Finally, a mere five years later, ITV created the best series imaginable, Agatha Christie's Poirot, starring the incredibly talented David Suchet as Hercule Poirot. This monumental series would span twenty five years.

As I stated before, some of the best adaptations of Agatha Christie's novels and short stories come from scripts that stay close to the original story. I mean, surely it's not hard to make a good story from the original and best selling novels of the Queen of Crime? The Poirot series generally sticks close to the novels, generally because of the intervention of David Suchet, especially as he is an Executive Producer of some of the later films. Some of the best adaptions are Death on the Nile (2004), Dead Man's Folly (2013), Five Little Pigs (2003) and After the Funeral (2006) as they are all faithful to Christie's work. Yes, there are some minor changes like removing certain unnecessary characters for length and budget purposes and making it shorter to make them fit ITV's 89 minute broadcast time, but they still closely resemble the novels they come from. Some of the adaptions that fall a little far from faithful are Halloween Party (2012) and Cards on the Table (2006) to name just two. The difference between the two is that the former makes sensible changes that improve the adaption and make it better for television. The latter however makes changes to the killer's motive that don't really fit in well with Christie's works. And why would you change the killer's motive? Surely Agatha Christie knew better when it comes to constructing the perfect crime?

©ITV - Julia McKenzie (right) as Miss Marple, with Wendy Craig

Two Poirot adaptions that don't seem to be anything to do with the original novels are The Big Four (2013) and Appointment with Death (2008). The latter makes outrageous changes to the novel by changing the setting, motive and killers, as well as changing the method of murder and the adding and removing suspects. One of the killers in the TV version is innocent in the novel! Although it is well directed and well acted (there are some great performances from Cheryl Campbell and Elizabeth McGovern), it has a poor script. However, even though The Big Four suffered from the curse of changes to the novel, the changes helped improve the novel. Most fans know (including Mark Gatiss and Ian Hallard, who adapted it) that The Big Four is an odd novel, which would be better suited to James Bond than Hercule Poirot. The changes turned it into a more believable Poirot mystery, and I think that Gatiss and Halldard did a fine job.

The recent ITV Marple series starring Geraldine McEwan (2004-2008) and Julia McKenzie (2009-2013) is notorius for its radical changes to the plots. Take the very first episode, The Body in the Library (2004), which changes the killers! But that's one of the more faithful of adaptions, as Nemesis (2008) and Sleeping Murder (2006) seem miles away from the novels they originated from. The episodes starring Julia McKenzie seem to have fared better, as A Pocketful of Rye (2009), The Mirror Crack'd From Side to Side (2011) and A Caribbean Mystery (2013) are all very faithful and brilliant adaptions. ITV have also made the decision to insert Miss Marple into novels she didn't originally appear in, as there are not enough Marple books to make the series long-lasting. Some of these episodes are brilliant, like Endless Night (2013), Murder Is Easy (2009) and The Pale Horse (2010), but there are some where Miss Marple just feels out of place, like Why Didn't They Ask Evans? (2011). Incidentally, the script for Evans? is a far cry from the original adaptation, and the novel.

So, to conclude, the general trend is that the best TV adaptions of Agatha Christie's work are ones that stick closely to the original novels. I think that adaptions should 80% Christie's story and 20% screenwriter's imagination. The best TV films are ones where the writer adds something of their own, like the voodoo and James Bond references in Charlie Higson's version of A Caribbean Mystery, or the additional murder in Elephants Can Remember. Slavishly sticking to the source material can be a little dull, as audiences don't want an exact repeat of the novel, otherwise it is not unique, but we don't want a complete re-writing either.