Sunday, September 19, 2010


I must confess that while I have read hundreds of mysteries in my time I have mostly avoided Agatha Christie. From my father I learned to be a snob. Everybody read Agatha Christie but few, as my father did, read Leslie Charteris. In all I may have read two Agatha Christies and my knowledge of the woman and her novels come from the superficially bumbling Miss Marple played by Margaret Rutherford. I had been frozen cold by Miss Marple played by the steely frigid Joan Hickson and I simply stopped bothering on any series that had to do with Miss Marple.



It wasn’t until today that I discovered (courtesy of the Vancouver Public Library, Oakridge Branch) the more intelligent, quiet and believable Miss Marpole as played by Geraldine McEwan in By The Pricking of My Thumbs. But then she wasn’t the star of the show as she had to share the limelight with the detective duo of Tommy and Tuppence (aka Thomas Beresford and Prudence Cowley).



And here is the clincher; Tommy is played by a dapper Anthony Andrews who seems to be a spook in MI6. Anthony Andrews is a delight to watch. But it is his wife that made me sit up and notice. She is played by Greta Scacchi. In this 2006 Granada Series of Marple (with Claire Bloom!), Scacchi plays a delicious (in spite of the 40s period clothing there is cleavage here and there and nice bit of leg and rump), semi-abandoned wife who is resorting to drink for escape. When murder becomes afoot she almost (not quite) forgets the booze.



It is here that I must confess that up until today I could have asserted as a fact that only Charlotte Rampling or Molly Parker would make me waver in my affections for Rosemary. I must now add Greta Scacchi. I have seen her in enough films including the recent Red Violin and in White Mischief (Oh, my!) with Charles Dance (also in today’s Marple, By the Pricking of My Thumbs), Geraldine Chaplin, John Hurt and my ever favourite Graham Greenian, Trevor Howard. But it wasn't until today that her SA (as we used to call it back when I was 9 or 10) hit me hard in my innards.



As I watched her performance I realized that at my age of 68, while my plumbing is most certainly suspect, it seemed to be working just fine. As I watched her I realized that at age 46 (she was born in 1960) she must be one of the few women that can give Charlotte Rampling a run for her money as the sexiest-older-woman-on-earth. And Scacchi has nothing to be jealous of Rampling in the acting department!



I might have watched an early Greta Scacchi and my spring garden would have been a good foil for her. A summer garden would have been just fine with Scacchi in some slightly older roles. But today’s role as Tuppence was perfect for me especially when I decided to visit my fall garden in the light drizzle.



Sometimes at my age (68) I feel I have seen enough and boredom is around the corner. Thanks to Tuppence, as played by Greta Scacchi, I must now assert that even though I don’t drink and I am faithful to my Rosemary, I would have gladly gotten sloshed with Tuppence and I would have ravished her behind the gazebo in today's fall garden.