Death on Denial
I have somehow managed to miss that Kenneth Branagh's adaptation of "Death on the Nile", framed as follow-up to his production of "Murder on the Orient Express", is a thing that is actually being done. The trailer came out last August, apparently, and I completely missed it. So of course I had to go see it.
Christie Geeking to ensue.
Okay, Linnet Ridgeway, Simon Doyle, and Jacqueline de Bellefort are easy enough to pick out in the trailer, simply because their story is pretty iconic. But who is who, here? I can tell that there's been some race shuffling, which is nice; I'd just like to see what they do with it. Off to Wikipedia, let's see this cast/character list!
Poirot. We knew that.
Bouc. Wait, that's the guy from the Orient Express. What's he doing here?
Euphemia Bouc. Who what? Played by Annette Bening ... she's got to be getting on in years now, so ... OHH, I get it, the Boucs are replacing the Allertons from the book. That makes total sense. Bouc was Poirot's sort-of host in "Orient Express", so he's taking over Tim Allerton's very similar role here. Well, technically, I guess it's Mrs Allerton (or Madame Bouc in this case) who was Poirot's host in the book, but you know what I mean.
Dr. Linus Windlesham. Who? The "Dr" part suggests he's supposed to be a non-German version of Dr. Bessner. I'm not sure I understand the reason for the change, but whatever. Maybe they're collapsing his role with another character. Why does "Windlesham" sound so familiar? (Checks book.) Oooh, Linnet Ridgeway was supposed to be romantically linked to a "Lord Windlesham" at one point -- that character's more backstory than background, but I guess they're planning something interesting there.
Andrew Katchadourian. Again, who? Goshdarnit, four names in and they're all unfamiliar to the story. I assume, based solely on the "Andrew", that this is supposed to be Andrew Pennington only not-American. Played by an Indian actor, it seems. Hm.
Mrs Bowers. Finally, a name I recognise -- the nurse. They made her a "Mrs" instead of a "Miss", but it might not mean anything.
Linnet Ridgeway. Gal Gadot ... interesting choice. Gadot isn't exactly "classically white"; she looks much more Mediterranean or ethnically ambiguous than the WASP one assumes the original Linnet to be. Then again, I don't remember the book actually stating outright that Linnet was even white. One simply assumes. Are they going to say she's Anglo-Indian, now? That would be interesting, and might explain the casting of Ali Fazal in the "Andrew Pennington" role. This could put a bit of depth into the role and the story. I mean, are they going to talk about British colonialism in India?
Simon Doyle. Y'know, I stumbled onto this originally because I wanted to look up this very recent scandal involving the actor, Armie Hammer. I probably shouldn't say much more about this.
Louise Bourget. Ooh, that's Gwen from Downton Abbey. Louise in the book was a bit of a non-entity, very much like the singing telegram girl in "Clue". The adaptation with Peter Ustinov as Poirot got her more involved by giving her a motive -- but then, that adaptation insisted on giving absolutely everybody a motive, which kind of made it feel a bit silly. Nevertheless, I'm hoping she gets a bit more of a role here.
Jacqueline de Bellefort. Okay. Nothing seems different here.
Salome Otterbourne. Ooh, they made her black. Very interesting.
Marie Van Schuyler. If Bowers is here, so must Mrs Van Schuyler be. And played Jennifer Saunders. I ... wait. They've got Dawn French as Bowers. Are these two going to be the movie's comedic relief?
Rosalie Otterbourne. Well, they couldn't not make her black, but the interesting thing here is that Rosalie's actress appears to be darker than Salome's. Excuse my noticing, but I was just watching a video about colourism the other day, which posited that the film industry has a tendency to relegate darker-skinned black women to older roles while younger black female characters, especially if they are meant to be romantic leads, tend to be cast as very fair. So I cannot wait to see how this plays out, especially since Rosalie Otterbourne is indeed supposed to have a romantic story arc.
Meredith Wilson. I have no idea who this character is, or who she's supposed to take over for. Colonel Race, perhaps?
No sign of Cornelia Robson or Ferguson. One of my favourite parts of the book was the bit where Cornelia chooses the aging Bessner over the younger and more conventionally attractive Ferguson, and gushes on about how Bessner is going to teach her all about neuroses and psychoses and stuff, but hey, I get it. There are a fair number of characters as it is, and it's better to cut out a few than to short-change someone -- as was unfortunately a necessity with "Orient Express" where the specific number of suspects was part of the point. And in many ways, despite Christie's attempts to cast one as "positive" and the other as "negative", Cornelia and Rosalie are basically the same character archetype. And without Cornelia, what is the point of Ferguson as a separate character?
Wait, is this Dr Windlesham going to be a combination of Bessner and Ferguson as well? That would make me laugh so much.
They also drop Jim Fanthorp, as well they should. That character had zero presence and personality in the book, and I think pretty much every adaptation drops him in favour of plumping up someone else.
Tim Allerton, as mentioned, is probably now going to be Bouc. But I know Tim Allerton's shady secret, and it's going to be very interesting to see how that plays out in conjunction with a man who's supposed to be a director of the Orient Express.
That was just an overuse of the word "interesting", wasn't it? I'm excited to see how this plays out.
Christie Geeking to ensue.
Okay, Linnet Ridgeway, Simon Doyle, and Jacqueline de Bellefort are easy enough to pick out in the trailer, simply because their story is pretty iconic. But who is who, here? I can tell that there's been some race shuffling, which is nice; I'd just like to see what they do with it. Off to Wikipedia, let's see this cast/character list!
Poirot. We knew that.
Bouc. Wait, that's the guy from the Orient Express. What's he doing here?
Euphemia Bouc. Who what? Played by Annette Bening ... she's got to be getting on in years now, so ... OHH, I get it, the Boucs are replacing the Allertons from the book. That makes total sense. Bouc was Poirot's sort-of host in "Orient Express", so he's taking over Tim Allerton's very similar role here. Well, technically, I guess it's Mrs Allerton (or Madame Bouc in this case) who was Poirot's host in the book, but you know what I mean.
Dr. Linus Windlesham. Who? The "Dr" part suggests he's supposed to be a non-German version of Dr. Bessner. I'm not sure I understand the reason for the change, but whatever. Maybe they're collapsing his role with another character. Why does "Windlesham" sound so familiar? (Checks book.) Oooh, Linnet Ridgeway was supposed to be romantically linked to a "Lord Windlesham" at one point -- that character's more backstory than background, but I guess they're planning something interesting there.
Andrew Katchadourian. Again, who? Goshdarnit, four names in and they're all unfamiliar to the story. I assume, based solely on the "Andrew", that this is supposed to be Andrew Pennington only not-American. Played by an Indian actor, it seems. Hm.
Mrs Bowers. Finally, a name I recognise -- the nurse. They made her a "Mrs" instead of a "Miss", but it might not mean anything.
Linnet Ridgeway. Gal Gadot ... interesting choice. Gadot isn't exactly "classically white"; she looks much more Mediterranean or ethnically ambiguous than the WASP one assumes the original Linnet to be. Then again, I don't remember the book actually stating outright that Linnet was even white. One simply assumes. Are they going to say she's Anglo-Indian, now? That would be interesting, and might explain the casting of Ali Fazal in the "Andrew Pennington" role. This could put a bit of depth into the role and the story. I mean, are they going to talk about British colonialism in India?
Simon Doyle. Y'know, I stumbled onto this originally because I wanted to look up this very recent scandal involving the actor, Armie Hammer. I probably shouldn't say much more about this.
Louise Bourget. Ooh, that's Gwen from Downton Abbey. Louise in the book was a bit of a non-entity, very much like the singing telegram girl in "Clue". The adaptation with Peter Ustinov as Poirot got her more involved by giving her a motive -- but then, that adaptation insisted on giving absolutely everybody a motive, which kind of made it feel a bit silly. Nevertheless, I'm hoping she gets a bit more of a role here.
Jacqueline de Bellefort. Okay. Nothing seems different here.
Salome Otterbourne. Ooh, they made her black. Very interesting.
Marie Van Schuyler. If Bowers is here, so must Mrs Van Schuyler be. And played Jennifer Saunders. I ... wait. They've got Dawn French as Bowers. Are these two going to be the movie's comedic relief?
Rosalie Otterbourne. Well, they couldn't not make her black, but the interesting thing here is that Rosalie's actress appears to be darker than Salome's. Excuse my noticing, but I was just watching a video about colourism the other day, which posited that the film industry has a tendency to relegate darker-skinned black women to older roles while younger black female characters, especially if they are meant to be romantic leads, tend to be cast as very fair. So I cannot wait to see how this plays out, especially since Rosalie Otterbourne is indeed supposed to have a romantic story arc.
Meredith Wilson. I have no idea who this character is, or who she's supposed to take over for. Colonel Race, perhaps?
No sign of Cornelia Robson or Ferguson. One of my favourite parts of the book was the bit where Cornelia chooses the aging Bessner over the younger and more conventionally attractive Ferguson, and gushes on about how Bessner is going to teach her all about neuroses and psychoses and stuff, but hey, I get it. There are a fair number of characters as it is, and it's better to cut out a few than to short-change someone -- as was unfortunately a necessity with "Orient Express" where the specific number of suspects was part of the point. And in many ways, despite Christie's attempts to cast one as "positive" and the other as "negative", Cornelia and Rosalie are basically the same character archetype. And without Cornelia, what is the point of Ferguson as a separate character?
Wait, is this Dr Windlesham going to be a combination of Bessner and Ferguson as well? That would make me laugh so much.
They also drop Jim Fanthorp, as well they should. That character had zero presence and personality in the book, and I think pretty much every adaptation drops him in favour of plumping up someone else.
Tim Allerton, as mentioned, is probably now going to be Bouc. But I know Tim Allerton's shady secret, and it's going to be very interesting to see how that plays out in conjunction with a man who's supposed to be a director of the Orient Express.
That was just an overuse of the word "interesting", wasn't it? I'm excited to see how this plays out.