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Murder is Easy is based on an Agatha Christie story first published in 1939, although this adaptation is set in 1954, and with apparently cultural anthropologist Luke Fitzwilliam (David Jonsson – Industry) coming from Nigeria to England to further his work, he’s drawn into a case detailed to him by a chance meeting on a train from Lavinia Pinkerton (Penelope Wilton – The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry), who is on her way to Epsom for Derby Day, declares that murder is easy for a certain type of person – listing a few such incidents which are being ignored by the cops*, and once she soon ends up brown bread – and since only she saw precisely what happened and is no longer around to spill the beans, can Luke use the force (since the Force don’t want to do any work) to point out that a series of unfortunate events are actually the actions of a killer?
Well, in the opening episode, there’s nice views of old-style London, and he’ll soon meet redhead Bridget Conway (Morfydd Clark – The Lord of the Rings: Rings of Power), plus the usual rag-tag bunch of dodgy types, who no doubt will each show traits of “I’m the baddie!”, some of whom have rather backward thinking, declaring Luke as having come from a “mud hut“(!)
Plus, more deaths occur and, at one point, a character says “Well, none of them were saints”, yet it should be “WAS“, not “were“. (This show had a writer?!)
Overall, this two-part drama is watchable but far from engaging. And when it came to the conclusion as to who did the deeds, what a load of nonsense. However, there was a nice – but obvious – reference to Gone With The Wind towards the end of it all.
Murder is Easy begins tonight on BBC1 at 9pm, but isn’t yet available to pre-order on Blu-ray or DVD. Both episodes are now available on the BBC iPlayer.
Director: Meenu Gaur
Producer: Karen Kelly
Writer: Sian Ejiwunmi-Le Berre
Novel: Agatha Christie
Music: Segun Akinola
Cast:
Luke Fitzwilliam: David Jonsson
Bridget Conway: Morfydd Clark
Lavinia Pinkerton: Penelope Wilton
Jimmy Amaike: Demmo Lapido
Ngozi Ude:Gloria Obianyo
Dr Thomas: Mathew Baynton
Rev Humbleby: Mark Bonnar
Mrs Humbleby: Nimra Bucha
Coroner: Ron Donachie
Major Horton: Douglas Henshall
Mrs Carter: Kathryn Howden
Amy Gibbs: Holly Howden Gilchrist
Rose Humbleby: Phoebe Licorish
Honoria Wayneflete: Sinead Matthews
Mrs Pierce: Tamzin Outhwaite
Rivers: Jon Pointing
Constable Reed: Kevin Mains
Lord Whitfield: Tom Riley
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.