It’s weird to say this out loud, but one of my first actual memories is being about six and scared shitless while watching the 1945 Rene Clair version of And Then There Were None. I was under the mistaken impression that Barry Fitzgerald was actually Tom Bosley, who I couldn’t get enough of on reruns of Murder, She Wrote and Happy Days. Most kids from my generation went through Power Rangers phases or GI Joe obsessions. I couldn’t get enough of Agatha Christie. By the time I was twelve, I’d read nearly all of her books, rented all of the Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple television adaptations and owned a double VHS copy of the incredibly awesome Murder On The Orient Express. Needless to say, I’m pretty stoked we’re about to get another film adaptation of the author’s work.
According to The Independent, Julian Fellowes, perhaps best known for his Gosford Park script, is adapting the novel Crooked House. The story, in Christie’s opinion the second best she ever wrote, follows a fiancé who’s told the marriage can’t go forward until the murderer of his future wife’s grandfather is apprehended. The tale is absent the author’s usual sleuths, Poirot and Marple, but the stuffy English mansion is right in her wheelhouse.
Death At A Funeral director Neil LaBute will helm the project set to begin filming in the UK later this year. To say I’m extremely optimistic would be an understatement. Here’s to hoping the adaptation performs better than expected, paving the way for plenty more of the same.
