The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side
- Episode aired May 23, 2010
- TV-PG
- 1h 28m
A troubled Hollywood star and her husband move to St. Mary Mead, but their arrival becomes clouded in tragedy when a fan is fatally poisoned during a garden fête.A troubled Hollywood star and her husband move to St. Mary Mead, but their arrival becomes clouded in tragedy when a fan is fatally poisoned during a garden fête.A troubled Hollywood star and her husband move to St. Mary Mead, but their arrival becomes clouded in tragedy when a fan is fatally poisoned during a garden fête.
- French Officer
- (as Jonathan Coyne)
- Director
- Writers
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaThis novel by Agatha Christie was dedicated to Dame Margaret Rutherford, the actress who played Miss Marple in a series of four British MGM second features in the 1960s. Although Christie thought that Rutherford was the wrong choice for the role, she highly respected her professionalism.
- Quotes
Margot Bence: Well, we lived in the East End of London, my mother and eight of us kids, and she simply couldn't cope. So she did what a lot of women did in her position and she wrote to the rich and famous, begged them to adopt, and one day she got lucky.
Miss Marple: Didn't Miss Gregg also adopt a boy?
Margot Bence: Yes. And for a time we lived the most wonderful life. Marina played her part to the hilt.
Dolly Bantry: But she did want children, didn't she?
Margot Bence: Oh, yes. She just didn't want us. As soon as she discovered she was pregnant, that was it. All she wanted was a child of her own.
Dolly Bantry: Well, you can't blame her for that.
Margot Bence: No. But I can blame her for taking me. And my mother for letting her.
- ConnectionsReferences An Inspector Calls (1954)
House lights activate to guide the audience along the aisles, while Miss Jane Marple (Julia McKenzie, in her fifth turn in the role) and neighbor Dolly Bantry (Joanna Lumley) enter the lobby to discuss the report that these two celebrities (Marina and Jason, who have met on the set of "Marie Antoinette" and have since married) plan to relocate to their community, and to Goston Hall, which Dolly has owned with late husband, Arthur.
Marina Gregg and young groom, Jason Rudd, indeed, arrive to welcome neighbors Dolly and Miss Marple for tea, but Miss Marple turns her ankle and becomes advised by Doctor Haydock (Neil Stuke) not to attend Marina and Jason's garden party for charity, to which she and Dolly have been invited.
Cherry Baker (Olivia Darnley) tends to Miss Marple's care and socializes with Primrose Dixon (Lois Jones), an employee of Marina and Jason's, who serves as a maid at their gathering, and reports information to Miss Marple through a curious Cherry.
Doctor Haydock attends the reception, meeting hosts and their employees and guests who are welcomed upstairs. Employees include Ella Blunt (Victoria Smurfit), Jason Rudd's Secretary, and Hailey Preston (Brennan Brown), Marina's Personal Assistant.
Guests include Counselor and Mrs. Hubbard (Michele Dotrice) and Heather Badcock (Caroline Quentin), Secretary of Association (who has assisted Jane Marple in her recovery), and Dolly Bantry, who snoops around her former residence with Mrs. Hubbard.
Margot Bence (Charlotte Riley) sneaks into the gathering to photograph the event and is spotted around corners and staircases with her active camera. She operates a studio, which Dolly and Miss Marple patronize when additional snooping call a bit later on.
Vincent Hogg (Martin Jarvis), entertainment columnist arrives with Lola Brewster (Hannah Waddingham) to crash the reception. Vincent has been one of Marina's former husbands, while Lola has been involved with Jason in the past.
But when a victim passes out and perishes after consuming narcotic-laced alcohol, Scotland Yard Inspector Hewitt (Hugh Bonneville) and Sergeant Tiddler (Samuel Barnett) arrive to investigate this overdose of anti-depressants and consider the possibility of murder, which seems to have been intended for a different victim.
As the authorities visit Miss Marple, who has been learning of various accounts of events transpiring at the manor, she, also, begins to conclude various scenarios, as Marina prepares for her next role as "Queen Nefertiti," under Jason's direction, opposite Gay actor Casey Croft (Will Young), about whom Marina complains for touching her. Maisie Cooper (Anna Anderson) participates in the second film play-within-a-play in a supporting role.
Along with Jason and his employees Ella Blunt, Primrose Dixon and Hailey Preston on hand at the studio, as well as the visiting Lola Brewster, Vincent Hogg, Margot Bence, Dolly Bantry and Miss Marple herself, many observe a temperamental Marina's reacting harshly to a substance which has been slipped into her coffee server.
But back at the scene of the first crime, a second body is discovered, as a result of cyanide poisoning.
And now, as Inspector Hewitt and Sergeant Tiddler continue to question witnesses and possible suspects, Agatha Christie's Miss Jane Marple attempts to solve the murders from a distance, after hearing first-hand accounts, and her re-thinking of a clue from "The Lady of Shilot," involving the line, "The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side."
Has any of this to do with adoptive children Margot and Angus, or handicapped birth son, Bobby? Will an injured Miss Marple be able to confront her suspect before a possible third murder transpires?
The cast is rounded out by Julie Salter as Banquet Guest, Jonathan Coyne as French Officer, Simon John Wilson as Press Reporter, Don Gallagher as Man in Livery, and Darren Petrucci in an unidentified role (possibly as ring-leader in the "Marie Antoinette" segment).
- WeatherViolet
- May 24, 2010
Details
- Release date
- Country of origin
- Language
- Also known as
- Panna Marple: Zwierciadlo peka w odlamków stos
- Filming locations
- North Mymms Park, Hertfordshire, England, UK(Grounds, lodge, exterior and interior of Gossington Hall)
- Production companies
- See more company credits at IMDbPro