Jane Marple, usually referred to as
Miss Marple, is a
fictional characterA character is the representation of a person in a narrative or dramatic work of art . Derived from the ancient Greek word kharaktêr through its Latin transcription character, the earliest use in English, in this sense, dates from the Restoration, although it became widely used after its...
appearing in twelve of
Agatha ChristieDame Agatha Christie DBE , was an English crime writer of novels, short stories and plays. She also wrote romances under the name Mary Westmacott, but is best remembered for her 80 detective novels and her successful West End theatre plays...
's crime novels. Miss Marple is an elderly
spinsterThe term "spinster" was originally intended to indicate a woman who spun wool, thereby living independently of a male wage. These women were invariably single and, due to the medieval fear of unmarried women, became correlated with their pagan sisters as witches...
who acts as an
amateurAn amateur is generally considered a person attached to a particular pursuit, study, or science, without formal training or pay. An amateur receives little or irregular income from their activities, and differs from a professional who makes a living from the pursuit and typically has some formal...
detectiveA detective is an investigator, either a member of a police agency or a private person. The latter may be known as private investigators...
, and lives in the village of
St. Mary MeadSt. Mary Mead was the fictional village created by popular crime fiction author Dame Agatha Christie.The quaint, sleepy village was home to the renowned detective spinster Miss Jane Marple. The village was first mentioned in a Miss Marple book in 1930, when it was the setting for the first Marple...
. She is one of the most famous of Christie's characters and has been portrayed numerous times on screen. Her first published appearance was in issue 350 of
The Royal Magazine for December 1927 with the first printing of the short story "The Tuesday Night Club" which later became the first chapter of
The Thirteen ProblemsThe Thirteen Problems is a short story collection written by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by Collins Crime Club in June 1932 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company in 1933 under the title The Tuesday Club Murders. The UK edition retailed at seven shillings and sixpence and the US...
(1932). Her first appearance in a full-length novel was in
The Murder at the VicarageThe Murder at the Vicarage is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club in October 1930 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company later in the same year...
in 1930.
Character
Miss Jane Marple is an elderly lady who lives in the little English village of
St. Mary MeadSt. Mary Mead was the fictional village created by popular crime fiction author Dame Agatha Christie.The quaint, sleepy village was home to the renowned detective spinster Miss Jane Marple. The village was first mentioned in a Miss Marple book in 1930, when it was the setting for the first Marple...
. Superficially stereotypical, she is dressed neatly in
tweedHarris Tweed , is a luxury cloth that has been handwoven by the islanders on the Isles of Harris, Lewis, Uist and Barra in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland, using local wool....
and is frequently seen knitting or pulling weeds in her garden. Miss Marple sometimes comes across as confused or "fluffy", but when it comes to solving mysteries, she has a sharp logical mind, and an almost unmatched understanding of human nature with all its weaknesses, strengths, quirks and foibles. In the
detective storyDetective fiction is a branch of crime fiction in which a detective , either professional or amateur, investigates a crime, often murder...
tradition, she often embarrasses the local "professional" police by solving mysteries that have them stumped.
Tape recordings Christie made in the mid 1960s reveal that 'Miss Marple' was partly based on Christie's
grandmotherGrandparents are the father or mother of a person's own father or mother. Everyone has a maximum of four genetic grandparents, eight genetic great-grandparents, sixteen genetic great-great-grandparents, etc...
. However, there is no definitive source for the derivation of the name 'Marple'. The most common explanation suggests that the name was taken from the
railway station in MarpleMarple railway station serves Marple, in the Metropolitan Borough of Stockport, Greater Manchester, England. The other station serving Marple is Rose Hill railway station....
,
StockportStockport is a large town in Greater Manchester, England. It lies on elevated ground on the River Mersey at the confluence of the rivers Goyt and Tame, southeast of the city of Manchester...
, through which Christie passed, with the alternative account that Christie took it from the home of a Marple family who lived at Marple Hall, near her sister Madge's home at Abney Hall. Agatha Christie attributed the inspiration for the character of Miss Marple to a number of sources: Miss Marple was "the sort of old lady who would have been rather like some of my grandmother’s Ealing cronies – old ladies whom I have met in so many villages where I have gone to stay as a girl". Christie also used material from her fictional creation, spinster Caroline Sheppard, who appeared in The Murder of Roger Ackroyd. When Michael Morton adapted Roger Ackroyd for the stage, he removed the character of Caroline replacing her with a young girl. This change saddened Christie and she determined to give old maids a voice: Miss Marple was born.
The character of Jane Marple in the first Miss Marple book,
The Murder at the VicarageThe Murder at the Vicarage is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club in October 1930 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company later in the same year...
, is markedly different from how she appears in later books. This early version of Miss Marple is a gleeful gossip and not an especially nice woman. The citizens of St. Mary Mead like her but are often tired by her nosy nature and how she seems to expect the worst of everyone. In later books she becomes more modern and a kinder person.
Miss Marple never married and has no close living relatives.
Vicarage introduced Miss Marple's nephew, the "well-known author" Raymond West. His wife Joan (initially called Joyce), a modern artist, was introduced in 1933 in
The Thirteen Problems. Raymond tends to be overconfident in himself and underestimates Miss Marple's mental powers. In her later years, Miss Marple has a live-in companion named Cherry Baker, who was first introduced in
The Mirror Crack'd From Side To Side.
Miss Marple is able to solve difficult crimes not only because of her shrewd intelligence, but because St. Mary Mead, over her lifetime, has given her seemingly infinite examples of the negative side of human nature. No crime can arise without reminding Miss Marple of some parallel incident in the history of her time. Miss Marple's acquaintances are sometimes bored by her frequent analogies to people and events from St. Mary Mead, but these analogies often lead Miss Marple to a deeper realization about the true nature of a crime. Although she looks like a sweet, frail old woman, Miss Marple is not afraid of dead bodies and is not easily intimidated. She also has a remarkable ability to latch onto a casual comment and connect it to the case at hand.
Miss Marple has never worked for her living and is of independent means, although she benefits in her old age from the financial support of Raymond West, her nephew (
A Caribbean MysteryA Caribbean Mystery is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club on November 16, 1964 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company the following year. The UK edition retailed at sixteen shillings and the US edition at $4.50...
,1964). She demonstrates a remarkably thorough education, including some art courses that involved study of human anatomy through the study of human cadavers. In
They Do It with MirrorsThey Do It With Mirrors is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company in 1952 under the title of Murder with Mirrors and in UK by the Collins Crime Club on November 17 in the same year under Christie's original title. The US edition...
(1952), it is revealed that, in her distant youth, Miss Marple spent time in Europe at a finishing school. She is not herself from the aristocracy or landed gentry, but is quite at home amongst them; Miss Marple would probably have been happy to describe herself as a
gentlewomanA gentlewoman in the original and strict sense is a woman of good family, analogous to the Latin generosus and generosa...
. Miss Marple may thus be considered a female version of that staple of British detective fiction, the
gentleman detectiveThe gentleman detective is a type of fictional character. He has long been a staple of crime fiction, particularly in detective novels and short stories set in Britain in the Golden Age...
. This education, history, and background are hinted at in the Margaret Rutherford films (see below), in which Miss Marple mentions her awards at marksmanship, fencing and equestrianism (although these hints are played for comedic value).
Christie wrote a concluding novel to her Marple series,
Sleeping MurderSleeping Murder: Miss Marple's Last Case is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club in October 1976 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company later in the same year. The UK edition retailed for £3.50 and the US edition at $7.95...
, in 1940. She locked it away in a bank vault so it would be safe should she be killed in
The BlitzThe Blitz was the sustained bombing of Britain by Nazi Germany between 7 September 1940 and 10 May 1941, in World War II. While the Blitz hit many towns and cities across the country, it began with the bombing of London for 57 consecutive nights...
. The novel was not published until shortly after Christie's death in 1976, some thirty-six years after it was originally written.
While Miss Marple is described as 'an old lady' in many of the stories, her age is mentioned in "At Bertram's Hotel", where it's said she visited the hotel when she was 14 and almost 60 years have passed since then. Excluding "Sleeping Murder", forty-one years passed between the first and last-written novels, and many characters grow and age. An example would be the Vicar's son. At the end of
The Murder at the Vicarage, the Vicar's wife is pregnant. In
The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side, it is mentioned that the son is now grown, successful and has a career. The effects of aging are seen on Miss Marple, such as needing vacation after illness in
A Caribbean MysteryA Caribbean Mystery is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club on November 16, 1964 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company the following year. The UK edition retailed at sixteen shillings and the US edition at $4.50...
or finding she can no longer knit due to poor eyesight in
The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side.
Novels featuring Miss Marple
- The Murder at the Vicarage
The Murder at the Vicarage is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club in October 1930 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company later in the same year...
(1930)
- The Body in the Library
The Body in the Library is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company in February 1942 and in UK by the Collins Crime Club in May of the same year. The US edition retailed at $2.00 and the UK edition at seven shillings and sixpence...
(1942)
- The Moving Finger
The Moving Finger is detective fiction novel by Agatha Christie, first published in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company in July 1942 and in UK by the Collins Crime Club in June 1943. The US edition retailed at $2.00 and the UK edition at seven shillings and sixpence...
(1943)
- A Murder is Announced
A Murder is Announced is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club in June 1950 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company in the same month...
(1950)
- They Do It with Mirrors
They Do It With Mirrors is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company in 1952 under the title of Murder with Mirrors and in UK by the Collins Crime Club on November 17 in the same year under Christie's original title. The US edition...
, or Murder with Mirrors (1952)
- A Pocket Full of Rye
A Pocket Full of Rye is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club on November 9, 1953 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company the following year. The UK edition retailed at ten shillings and sixpence and the US edition at $2.75...
(1953)
- 4.50 from Paddington
4.50 from Paddington is detective fiction novel by Agatha Christie, first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club on November 4 1957, and in US by Dodd, Mead and Company in the same month under the title of What Mrs. McGillicuddy Saw!. The UK edition retailed at twelve shillings and sixpence ...
, or What Mrs. McGillicuddy Saw! (1957)
- The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side
The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club on November 12, 1962 and in US by Dodd, Mead and Company in September 1963 under the shorter title of The Mirror Crack'd and with a copyright date of 1962...
, or The Mirror Crack'd (1962)
- A Caribbean Mystery
A Caribbean Mystery is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club on November 16, 1964 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company the following year. The UK edition retailed at sixteen shillings and the US edition at $4.50...
(1964)
- At Bertram's Hotel
At Bertram's Hotel is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club on November 15, 1965 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company the following year. The UK edition retailed at sixteen shillings and the US edition at $4.50...
(1965)
- Nemesis (1971)
- Sleeping Murder
Sleeping Murder: Miss Marple's Last Case is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club in October 1976 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company later in the same year. The UK edition retailed for £3.50 and the US edition at $7.95...
(written around 1940, published 1976)
Miss Marple short story collections
- "The Tuesday Night Club
"The Tuesday Night Club" is a short story written in 1927, by Agatha Christie. It is the first of her works to feature Miss Marple.The story was first published in The Royal Magazine in December 1927, and later became the first chapter of The Thirteen Problems .-See also:* The Thirteen Problems for...
" (short story) featured Miss Marple for the first time ever. Written in 1927.
- The Thirteen Problems
The Thirteen Problems is a short story collection written by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by Collins Crime Club in June 1932 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company in 1933 under the title The Tuesday Club Murders. The UK edition retailed at seven shillings and sixpence and the US...
(short story collection featuring Miss Marple, also published as The Tuesday Club Murders) (1932)
- Miss Marple's Final Cases and Two Other Stories
Miss Marple's Final Cases and Two Other Stories is a short story collection written by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by Collins Crime Club in October 1979 retailing at £4.50...
(short stories collected posthumously, also published as Miss Marple's Final Cases, but only six of the eight stories actually feature Miss Marple) (written between 1939 and 1954, published 1979)
Miss Marple also appears in
Greenshaw's Folly, a short story traditionally included as part of the Poirot collection
The Adventure of the Christmas PuddingThe Adventure of the Christmas Pudding and a Selection of Entrées is a short story collection written by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club on October 24 1960. It is the only Christie first edition published in the UK that contains stories with both Hercule...
(1960). Four stories in the
Three Blind MiceThree Blind Mice and Other Stories is a short story collection written by Agatha Christie and first published in in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company in 1950...
collection (1950) feature Miss Marple:
Strange Jest,
Tape-Measure Murder,
The Case of the Caretaker, and
The Case of the Perfect Maid.
Books about Miss Marple
- The Life and Times of Miss Jane Marple -- a biography
A biography is a description or account of someone's life and the times, which is usually published in the form of a book or essay, or in some other form, such as a film. An autobiography is a biography of a person's life written or told by that same person...
by Anne Hart
Margaret Rutherford
Although popular from her first appearance in 1930, Jane Marple had to wait thirty-two years for her first
big-screenFilm encompasses individual motion pictures, the field of film as an art form, and the motion picture industry. Films are produced by recording images from the world with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects....
appearance. When she made it, the results were found disappointing to Christie purists and Christie herself, nevertheless Agatha Christie dedicated the novel
The Mirror Crack'd from Side to SideThe Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club on November 12, 1962 and in US by Dodd, Mead and Company in September 1963 under the shorter title of The Mirror Crack'd and with a copyright date of 1962...
to Margaret Rutherford.
Murder, She SaidMurder, She Said is a murder mystery film directed by George Pollock, loosely based on the novel 4.50 from Paddington by Agatha Christie. The production starred Margaret Rutherford as Miss Marple, alongside her real life husband Stringer Davis....
(1961, directed by
George PollockGeorge Pollock was a British film director, best known for bringing Agatha Christie's famous detective Miss Marple to the big screen for the first time, starring Margaret Rutherford.-Life and work :...
) was the first of four British MGM productions starring Dame
Margaret RutherfordDame Margaret Rutherford DBE was an English character actress, who first came to prominence following World War II in the film adaptations of Noel Coward's Blithe Spirit, and Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest...
. She presented the character as a bold old lady, different from the prim and birdlike character Christie created in her novels. This first film was based on the 1957 novel
4:50 from Paddington (U.S. title,
What Mrs. McGillicuddy Saw!), and the changes made in the plot were typical of the series. In the film, Mrs. McGillicuddy does not see anything because there is no Mrs. McGillicuddy. Miss Marple herself sees an apparent murder committed on a train running alongside hers. Likewise, it is Miss Marple herself who poses as a maid to find out the facts of the case, not a young friend of hers who has made a business of it. Joan Hickson played the part of the home help in this film and can claim to have appeared in two Miss Marple series.
The other Rutherford films (all directed by
George PollockGeorge Pollock was a British film director, best known for bringing Agatha Christie's famous detective Miss Marple to the big screen for the first time, starring Margaret Rutherford.-Life and work :...
) were
Murder at the GallopMurder at the Gallop is the second of four films made by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, based on the novel After the Funeral by Agatha Christie, and starring Margaret Rutherford as Miss Jane Marple, Charles "Bud" Tingwell as Inspector Craddock and Stringer Davis as Mr. Stringer. The film changes the action...
(1963), based on the 1953 Hercule Poirot novel
After the FuneralAfter the Funeral is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company in March 1953 under the title of Funerals are Fatal and in UK by the Collins Crime Club on May 18 of the same year under Christie's original title...
(In this film, she is identified as Miss JTV Marple, though there were no indication as to what the extra initials might stand for);
Murder Most Foul
Murder Most Foul is the third of four films, made by MGM, loosely based on novels by Agatha Christie and starring Margaret Rutherford as Miss Jane Marple, Bud Tingwell as Inspector Craddock and Stringer Davis as Mr Stringer.The film was made in 1964 and directed by George Pollock, with David...
(1964), based on the 1952 Poirot novel
Mrs McGinty's DeadMrs. McGinty's Dead is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie first published in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company in February 1952 and in the UK by the Collins Crime Club on March 3 of the same year. The US edition retailed at $2.50 and the UK edition nine shillings and sixpence...
; and
Murder Ahoy!Murder Ahoy! is the last of four Miss Marple films, made by MGM and starring Margaret Rutherford. As in the three previous films, Margaret Rutherford plays Miss Jane Marple, Bud Tingwell is Inspector Craddock and Stringer Davis plays Mr Stringer.The film was made in 1964 and directed by George...
(1964). The last film is not based on any Christie work but displays a few plot elements from
They Do It With Mirrors (viz., the ship is used as a reform school for wayward boys and one of the teachers uses them as a crime force), and there is a kind of salute to
The Mousetrap. Rutherford also appeared briefly as Miss Marple in the spoof Hercule Poirot adventure
The Alphabet MurdersThe Alphabet Murders is a 1965 British detective film based on the novel The A.B.C. Murders by Agatha Christie, starring Tony Randall as Hercule Poirot.-Plot:The film varies significantly from the novel and adds a comedic flavour to the story-Cast:...
(1965).
Rutherford, who was 70 years-old when the first film was made, insisted that she wore her own clothes during the filming of the movie, as well as having her real-life husband,
Stringer DavisStringer Davis was an English character actor.Davis was born at in Birkenhead, England...
appear alongside her as the character 'Mr Stringer'. The Rutherford films are frequently repeated on television in Germany, and in that country Miss Marple is generally identified with Rutherford's quirky portrayal.
Angela Lansbury
In 1980,
Angela LansburyAngela Brigid Lansbury, CBE is an English actress and singer whose career has spanned seven decades. Her first film appearance was in Gaslight , for which she received an Academy Award nomination as a malevolent maid, and she expanded her repertoire to Broadway and television in the 1950s...
played Miss Marple in
The Mirror Crack'dThe Mirror Crack'd is a 1980 feature motion picture directed by Guy Hamilton featuring Angela Lansbury, Geraldine Chaplin, Tony Curtis, Edward Fox, Rock Hudson, Kim Novak, and Elizabeth Taylor....
(EMI, directed by
Guy HamiltonGuy Hamilton is a noted English film director.Hamilton was born in Paris, France where his English parents were living. Remaining in France during the Nazi occupation, he was active in the French Resistance...
), based on Christie's 1962 novel. However, Lansbury is only on screen for a short time, the bulk of the film being taken up with the machinations of an all-star cast that included
Elizabeth TaylorDame Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor, DBE , also known as Liz Taylor, is an English-born British-American actress. Known for her acting skills and beauty, as well as her Hollywood lifestyle, including many marriages...
,
Rock HudsonRock Hudson was an American film and television actor, recognized as a romantic leading man during the 1960s and 1970s, most notably in several romantic comedies with his most famous co-star, Doris Day...
,
Geraldine ChaplinGeraldine Leigh Chaplin is a Golden Globe and BAFTA Award-nominated actress and the daughter of Charlie Chaplin.-Personal life:...
,
Tony CurtisTony Curtis is an American film actor. He has played a variety of roles, from light comic, such as the musician on the run from gangsters in Some Like It Hot, to serious dramatic roles, such as an escaped convict in The Defiant Ones, which earned him a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actor...
, and
Kim NovakKim Novak is a two-time Golden Globe Award-winning American actress. She is best known for her performance in the classic 1958 film Vertigo...
.
Edward FoxEdward Charles Morrice Fox, OBE is an English stage, film and television actor. He is generally associated with the role of an upper-class Englishman...
appeared as Inspector Craddock, who did Miss Marple's legwork. Lansbury's Marple was a crisp, intelligent woman who moved stiffly and spoke in clipped tones. Unlike most incarnations of Miss Marple, this one smoked cigarettes.
Ita Ever
In 1983,
EstonianEstonians are a Finnic people closely related to the Finns and inhabiting, primarily, the country of Estonia. The Estonians speak a Finno-Ugric language, known as Estonian...
stage and film actress
Ita EverIta Ever is an Estonian film, radio, theater and television actress.Ita Ever began her career in 1953 as a stage actress and has appeared in numerous Estonian and Russian film productions...
starred in the Russian language film adaptation of Agatha Christie's novel
A Pocket Full of RyeA Pocket Full of Rye is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club on November 9, 1953 and in the US by Dodd, Mead and Company the following year. The UK edition retailed at ten shillings and sixpence and the US edition at $2.75...
(using the Russian edition's translated title,
The Secret of the Blackbirds) as the character of Miss Marple.
Helen Hayes
American stage and screen legend
Helen HayesHelen Hayes was an American actress whose career spanned almost 70 years. She eventually garnered the nickname "First Lady of the American Theatre" and was one of only ten people who have won an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar and a Tony Award...
portrayed Miss Marple in two American made-for-TV movies, both for
CBSCBS Broadcasting Inc. is an American television network, one of television's original "big three", which also include NBC and ABC. Like NBC, CBS started out as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System...
:
A Caribbean Mystery (1983) and
Murder with Mirrors (1984).
Sue GraftonSue Taylor Grafton is a contemporary American author of detective novels.-Early years:Born in Louisville, Kentucky, Sue Grafton is the daughter of novelist C. W. Grafton and Vivian Harnsberger, both of whom were the children of Presbyterian ministers. Grafton and her sister Ann were raised in...
contributed to the screenplay of the former. Hayes's Marple was benign and chirpy.
Rakhee
The
BengaliThe Bengali people are an ethnic community native to the historic region of Bengal in South Asia. They speak Bengali , which is an Indo-Aryan language of the eastern Indian subcontinent, evolved from the Magadhi Prakrit and Sanskrit languages. In their native language, they are referred to as বাঙালী...
actress Rakhee played Miss Marple in the 2003 film
Shubho MahuratShubho Mahurat is an award-winning Indian Bengali feature film directed by Rituparno Ghosh. The film is based on Agatha Christie's Miss Marple story The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side.-Plot:...
, the Indian film adaption of
The Mirror Crack'd from Side to SideThe Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the UK by the Collins Crime Club on November 12, 1962 and in US by Dodd, Mead and Company in September 1963 under the shorter title of The Mirror Crack'd and with a copyright date of 1962...
directed by
Rituparno GhoshRituparno Ghosh is a Bengali film director. He has won a National Film Award in India and several awards at international film festivals abroad.- Biography :...
.
Television
American TV was the setting for the first dramatic portrayal of Miss Marple with
Gracie FieldsDame Gracie Fields, DBE , born Grace Stansfield, was an English-born, later Italian-based actress, singer and comedienne widely hailed as one of the greatest stars of both cinema and music hall.-Early life:...
, the legendary British actress, playing her in a 1956 episode of
Goodyear TV Playhouse based on
A Murder Is Announced, the 1950 Christie novel.
In 1970, the character of Miss Marple was portrayed by Inge Langen in a West German television adaptation of
The Murder at the Vicarage (
Mord im Pfarrhaus).
From 1984 to 1992, the
BBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation, usually referred to by its abbreviation as the "BBC", is the longest established and largest broadcaster in the world...
adapted all of the original Miss Marple novels as a series titled
Miss MarpleMiss Marple was a British television series based on the Miss Marple murder mystery novels by Agatha Christie. It starred Joan Hickson in the title role and aired from 1984 to 1992. All twelve original Miss Marple Christie novels were dramatised. The screenplays were written by T. R...
.
Joan HicksonJoan Hickson OBE was an English actress of theatre, film and television, who achieved fame in her old age playing Agatha Christie's Miss Marple in the television series Miss Marple.- Biography :...
played the lead role. (Coincidentally, Hickson had played a cook in the first film in which Margaret Rutherford played Miss Marple.) These programs, which are actually a set of 12 feature-length TV movies rather than a TV series in the usual sense, followed the plots of the original novels more closely than previous film and television adaptations had. Hickson has come to be regarded by many as the definitive Miss Marple (indeed Agatha Christie herself once remarked years earlier that she would like Joan Hickson to play Miss Marple).
Angela LansburyAngela Brigid Lansbury, CBE is an English actress and singer whose career has spanned seven decades. Her first film appearance was in Gaslight , for which she received an Academy Award nomination as a malevolent maid, and she expanded her repertoire to Broadway and television in the 1950s...
, after playing Miss Marple in
The Mirror Crack'd, went on to star in the TV series
Murder, She WroteMurder, She Wrote was an American television mystery series starring Angela Lansbury as mystery writer and amateur detective Jessica Fletcher. The series aired for twelve seasons from 1984 to 1996 on the CBS network. It was followed by four TV films and a spin-off series, The Law & Harry McGraw...
as
Jessica FletcherJessica Fletcher is a fictional character portrayed on the American television series Murder, She Wrote by veteran Tony-winning actress Angela Lansbury. She portrayed her for 12 years on the show, and from 1997-2003 in four TV movies, giving her a 19-year run...
, a mystery novelist who also solves crimes. The character was based in part on Miss Marple and another Christie character,
Ariadne OliverAriadne Oliver is a fictional character in the novels of Agatha Christie. She is a mystery novelist and a friend of Hercule Poirot.- Profile :...
.
Beginning in 2004,
ITVITV is a public service network of British commercial television broadcasters, set up under the Independent Television Authority to provide competition to the BBC. ITV is the oldest commercial television network in the UK...
broadcast a series of adaptations of Agatha Christie's books under the title
Agatha Christie's Marple, usually referred to as
MarpleMarple is a British television series based on the Miss Marple and other murder mystery novels by Agatha Christie. It is also known as Agatha Christie's Marple. The title character was played by Geraldine McEwan from the first to third series, until her retirement from the role...
. Geraldine McEwanGeraldine McEwan is an English actress, with a diverse history in theatre, film and television. From 2004–2009 she appeared as Miss Marple, the Agatha Christie sleuth, for the series Marple shown on ITV1 in the UK, and PBS in the U.S.-Background:She was born Geraldine McKeown on 9 May 1932, in Old...
starred in the first three series.
Julia McKenzie-Career:McKenzie was born in Enfield, Middlesex, England, the daughter of Kathleen Rowe and Albion McKenzie. She is also a patron of the Stephen Sondheim Appreciation Society.-Theatre:...
took over the role in the fourth season. The adaptions are notable for changing the plots and characters of the original books (e.g. incorporating lesbian affairs, changing killer identities, re-naming or removing significant characters, and even using stories from other books where Miss Marple didn't originally feature).
From 2004 to 2005,
Japanis an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, People's Republic of China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
ese TV network
NHKNHK is Japan's national public broadcasting organization...
produced a 39 episode
animeis animation originating in Japan. The world outside Japan regards anime as "Japanese animation". Anime originated about 1917.Anime, like manga , has a large audience in Japan and high recognition throughout the world...
series titled
Agatha Christie's Great Detectives Poirot and Marpleis an anime television series that adapted several Agatha Christie stories about Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple. A new character named Mabel West, Miss Marple's great-niece, who becomes Poirot's junior assistant, is used to connect the two detectives....
, which features both Miss Marple and
Hercule PoirotHercule Poirot is a fictional Belgian detective created by Agatha Christie. Along with Miss Marple, Poirot is one of Christie's most famous and long-lived characters, appearing in 33 novels and 51 short stories that were published between 1920 and 1975 and set in the same era.Poirot has been...
. Miss Marple's voice is provided by
Kaoru Yachigusais a Japanese actress from Osaka Prefecture. From 1947 to 1957 she was a member of the Takarazuka Revue. Since leaving the Revue, she has been active in film, television, and narration....
.
Stage
In 1974, Barbara Mullen played Miss Marple in "Murder at the Vicarage" at the Savoy Theatre, London.
In September 1977, veteran actress and authoress
Dulcie GrayDulcie Gray, CBE, also known as Dulcie Savage, was born Dulcie Winifred Catherine Bailey in Kuala Lumpur, Malaya on 20 November 1915, and is a veteran British actress of the stage and screen. She went to school in Wallingford, Oxfordshire and then returned to Malaya to teach...
played the Miss Marple character in a stage adaptation of
A Murder Is Announced at the Vaudeville Theatre in London, England.
Radio
BBC Radio 4BBC Radio 4 is a domestic UK radio station that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967.-Outline:...
dramatised all of the novels from 1993-2001 with
June WhitfieldJune Rosemary Whitfield, CBE is an English actress, known in the United Kingdom since the 1950s for roles in radio and television comedy series....
as Miss Marple.
| Title |
Show |
Episodes |
Episode Frequency |
Original airdate |
| Murder At the Vicarage |
|
5 |
Daily |
26 December - 30 December 1993 |
| A Pocket Full of Rye |
The Saturday Playhouse |
1 |
|
11 February 1995 |
| At Bertram's Hotel |
|
5 |
Daily |
25 December - 29 December 1995 |
| The 4:50 From Paddington |
The Saturday Playhouse |
1 |
|
29 March 1997 |
| A Caribbean Mystery |
|
5 |
Weekly |
30 October - 27 November 1997 |
| The Mirror Crack'd From Side to Side |
Agatha Christie Special |
1 |
|
29 August 1998 |
| Nemesis |
|
5 |
Weekly |
9 November - 7 December 1998 |
| The Body In the Library |
The Saturday Play |
1 |
|
22 May 1999 |
| A Murder Is Announced |
|
5 |
Weekly |
9 August - 6 September 1999 |
| The Moving Finger |
The Saturday Play |
1 |
|
5 May 2001 |
| They Do It With Mirrors |
|
5 |
Weekly |
23 July 2001 - 20 August 2001 |
| Sleeping Murder |
The Saturday Play |
1 |
|
8 December 2001 |
External links