Kenneth Branagh will play Hercule Poirot in an adaptation of Murder on the Orient Express that he will also direct, according to Variety.
Agatha Christie’s story, published in 1934, puts the detective aboard a murder mystery set on the famous long-distance passenger train. When an unsavoury American called Mr Ratchett is killed, Poirot must discover which of the train’s passengers — all of whom have a connection to the dead man — is the murderer.
Branagh, whose last film as director was the fairytale adaptation Cinderella, will be following in the steps of Sidney Lumet, whose 1974 film of the story starred Albert Finney as Poirot. The suspects were played by an all-star cast including Lauren Becall, Ingrid Bergman, Sean Connery and Vanessa Redgrave. The film was a hit with audiences, taking $35 million (Dh128.5 million) in the US, and was nominated for six Oscars, including best supporting actress, which Bergman went on to win.
Christie, who was scathing about many film and television adaptations of her books, was apparently cautiously supportive of Lumet’s take. Her second husband, archaeologist Max Mallowan, told biographers that she had had a “grudging appreciation” of Lumet’s film, but was doubtful about Finney’s Poirot moustache. “I wrote that [Poirot] had the finest moustache in England — and he didn’t in the film,” she allegedly said. “I thought that a pity — why shouldn’t he?”
