TV-PG | 2 episodes | Mystery | 2024
Readers of Dame Agatha Christie’s mysteries will tell you it is dangerous to underestimate little old ladies. Everyone knows about Miss Jane Marple, who solved cases for 32 crimes in Christie’s classic novels and short stories. The similarly perceptive Miss Lavinia Pinkerton also deduced the identity of a serial killer secretly stalking her sleepy English village, but the culprit will murder her before she can inform Scotland Yard. After their chance encounter, a young civil servant hunts for her killer in Sian Ejiwunmi-Le Berre’s two-part adaptation of Christie’s “Murder is Easy,” directed by Meenu Gaur.
Suspects
Fitzwilliam soon meets a large contingent of suspects. According to the late Pinkerton, the killer presents a façade of immaculate respectability, so he mostly focuses on villagers whose social circles revolve around the nouveau riche Lord Whitfield (Tom Riley), a reputed “war profiteer.” Fitzwilliam’s fast friendship with Whitfield’s fiancée, his former secretary Bridget Conway (Morfydd Clark) is initially convenient for his investigation, but it grows awkward as their mutual romantic attraction grows.Of all the alterations from Christie’s novel, the character of Dr. Thomas (Matthew Baynton) receives the harshest treatment, with Ms. Ejiwunmi-Le Berre transforming him into a virulently racist proponent of eugenics. At least the climactic revelation remains faithful to the original novel. Rewriting Dame Agatha in this regard is almost sacrilegious, but it has been predecessors, most notably in the ill-conceived 2018 television adaptation of “Ordeal by Innocence.”
Still, Ms. Ejiwunmi-Le Berre seems to miss what makes Christie’s mysteries so entertaining for her many fans. We never get a sense during either installment of “Murder Is Easy” that Fitzwilliam and Conway are carefully analyzing clues to determine the murderer’s identity. Instead, they simply chase the trail of dead bodies, like the protagonist of a TV detective series from the 1980s.
Unnecessary Interruptions
In addition to dumbing down Christie, Berre also periodically interrupts the mystery to make political statements regarding British colonialism. This actually does a disservice to Mr. Jonsson, whose everyman performance as Fitzwilliam is appealingly earnest. He should have had the chance to play this part as a traditional romantic leading man, unencumbered with the baggage that comes with serving as some kind of ideological symbol.Indeed, Mr. Jonsson has nice chemistry with Ms. Clark, whose upbeat energy as Conway is equally winning. Viewers will want to root for them as a couple, in the same way they did watching previous TV adaptations.
At least Tom Riley is entertainingly nasty as the arrogant Lord Whitfield. His scenery chewing is almost cartoonish, but it is fun to watch. Among the large ensemble, both Ms. Wilton and Douglas Henshall stand out in a positive way, adding eccentric vigor as the ill-fated Miss Pinkerton and Maj. Horton, a progressive veteran, who befriends Fitzwilliam. It is always refreshing to see a military vet portrayed in healthy, sympathetic terms, in any context. Maj. Horton definitely qualifies, in that regard.
As for Ms. Wilton (an original “Downton Abbey” cast member), her necessarily brief appearance as Pinkerton is so memorable, she seems like a natural fit to portray Miss Marple (as it happens, she is about 20 years older than Angela Lansbury when the latter famously played the beloved amateur sleuth in “The Mirror Crack’d”).
Christie’s often overlooked detective, Superintendent Battle, had a fleeting appearance in the original “Murder Is Easy” novel, but he was cut from this latest adaptation. Perhaps that was a lost opportunity to reintroduce him to viewers, considering he is the central detective in Christie’s novel “Towards Zero,” which was announced as the next BBC Christie adaptation.
Frankly, a number of mistakes were made in this version of “Murder Is Easy.” It just never quite fully embraces the cozy mystery tradition, and it fails to live up to Dame Agatha’s sophisticated slyness. It passes the time, but the new “Murder Is Easy” cannot be recommended as anything special.
