Partners In Crime - major new BBC One drama for Agatha Christie’s 125th celebration year
"In bringing these thrilling
stories to the screen, it is our ambition for Tommy and Tuppence to
finally take their rightful place alongside Poirot and Marple as
iconic Agatha Christie characters."
David Walliams
Date: 18.09.2014
Last updated: 18.09.2014 at 08.42
Category: BBC One;
Drama; Commissions and casting
BBC One brings Endor
Productions and Acorn Productions' Agatha Christie’s married couple
Tommy and Tuppence to life in a brand-new six-part adventure series
for the channel. Partners In Crime stars David Walliams (Little
Britain, Big School) as
Tommy and Jessica
Raine (Call The Midwife, Wolf Hall) as Tuppence.
Directed by Edward
Hall (Restless, Downton Abbey), episodes 1-3, 'The Secret Adversary',
are written by award-winning author, playwright and director Zinnie
Harris, (Spooks, Born With Two Mothers, Richard Is My Boyfriend) with
the following three, 'N or M?' penned by Claire Wilson, (Where There
Is Darkness, Twist).
Partners In Crime is
produced by Georgina Lowe, (Mr Turner, Mad Dogs), executive produced
by Emmy award-winning Hilary Bevan Jones (Roald Dahl’s Esio Trot,
State Of Play), David Walliams, Hilary Strong (Poirot, Have I Got
News For You) and Mathew Prichard for Acorn Productions/Agatha
Christie Ltd and Matthew Read for the BBC.
Partners In Crime is
an adventure series with espionage and humour at its heart. Set in a
1950s Britain rising from the ashes of the Blitz into the grip of a
new Cold War, our beekeeping duo stumble into a world of murder,
undercover agents and cold war conspiracy.
Tuppence is a woman
who sees adventure round every corner, throwing herself head first
into every mystery with passion and fervour, determined to get to the
truth no matter what it takes, much to the dismay of her more
cautious husband Tommy.
Hilary Bevan Jones,
executive producer and founder of Endor Productions, says: “To
introduce the iconic Christie characters Tommy and Tuppence and their
adventures to a whole new generation, is a fabulous opportunity for
all of us at Endor. Our incredible creative team of David Walliams,
Zinnie Harris and Claire Wilson are crafting a drama that promises to
be exciting, fun and fresh. With the inspirational Edward Hall
directing the whole series, and Georgina Lowe producing, we have a
clarity and cohesiveness of ambition that promises only the best.”
David Walliams says:
“In bringing these thrilling stories to the screen, it is our
ambition for Tommy and Tuppence to finally take their rightful place
alongside Poirot and Marple as iconic Agatha Christie characters. I
was first drawn to the delicious notion of a married couple solving
crimes together, and the more I read of the Tommy and Tuppence novels
and short stories, the more I realised they are among Christie’s
very best work.”
Hilary Strong,
Managing Director, Acorn Productions, says: “We are excited to be
working with the BBC and Endor to bring Agatha Christie to a whole
new generation of viewers as we continue to build the Christie brand
worldwide. Partners In Crime is the first of two major new dramas for
2015, the second of which is a new production of And Then There Were
None, one of Christie’s most popular novels of all time. I am
delighted that our partnership with the BBC will play a central part
in our 125th anniversary celebrations next year.”
Mathew Prichard,
Chairman of Agatha Christie Ltd, says: “The first Tommy and
Tuppence novel was published in 1922 and my grandmother, Agatha
Christie, would be thrilled to see her crime-fighting team
reinvigorated for the BBC over 90 years on from when she first
brought them to life.”
Ben Stephenson
Controller of Drama Commissioning, says: “This new and exciting
partnership between David and Jessica promises to bring a fresh new
take on these classic and well-loved adventures. With their
combination of humour, wit and talent, I can’t think of two people
better suited to take on the iconic roles of Tommy and Tuppence.”
THE INTERNATIONAL
AGATHA CHRISTIE
FESTIVAL
SEPTEMBER 2015 |
TORQUAY, DEVON
ABOUT THE FESTIVAL
AGATHA CHRISTIE:
LIFE, LITERATURE, LEGACY
The 2015
International Agatha Christie Festival takes place in Torquay, Devon,
UK between 11 – 20 September.
Celebrating the
125th anniversary of the birth of the Queen of Crime, the festival
offers a week-long programme of new and unique events.
Our programme
includes performances and film screenings, expert talks exploring
Agatha Christie’s life and times, and opportunities to enjoy food,
drink and dancing in some of the finest venues on the English
Riviera.
At Torre Abbey
visitors will find the International Agatha Christie Festival ‘hub’.
The entrance ticket will provide access to the house, gardens and
Book Tent as well as a free programme of daily activities and a very
special newly-curated exhibition, Agatha Christie: Unfinished
Portrait.
Ticketed events will
also be held in The Spanish Barn at Torre Abbey, The Grand Hotel, The
Imperial Hotel, the Princess Theatre, the Palace Theatre, The Little
Theatre, Torquay Museum, Cockington Court, Greenway (National Trust),
Churston Church and Oddicombe Beach.
For those seeking
creative inspiration there will also be a professionally led workshop
programme for aspiring writers and plenty of participatory events for
young people
We will shortly be
adding a map of Torbay showing quirky quieter spaces in which
visitors may wish to do their own creative writing or simply read and
watch the world go by.
Tickets for most of
the festival events are available through our dedicated festival
online bookings system. Some venues are selling tickets directly so
please read the booking details carefully.
---------------------------------------------------------------
THE 2015 FESTIVAL
PROGRAMME
This year the
International Agatha Christie Festival celebrates the life,
literature and legacy of Agatha Christie on the 125th anniversary of
her birth in Torquay with an exciting mix of literary talks from
best-selling crime writers, theatre performances, talks, writers’
workshops, children’s events, cookery demonstrations, film
screenings, a birthday garden party, a tea dance and a glamorous
ball.
Each day of our
nine-day festival has a theme around which the events have been
programmed.
Friday 11 September
– Festival launch
Saturday 12
September – Festive Family Fun
Sunday 13 September
– Agatha Christie and the First World War
Monday 14 September
– Miss Marple, Music and Unsolved Mysteries
Tuesday 15 September
– The Birthday and the next 125 years.
Wednesday 16
September – The Golden Age of Detective Fiction
Thursday 17
September – International Christie and Adaptations
Friday 18 September
– Agatha Christie and the Theatre
Saturday 19
September – Agatha for Everyone
Sunday 20 September
– Festival Finale
------------------------------------------------------------------------
ABOUT AGATHA
CHRISTIE
Agatha Christie: a
life in brief
Born into a
prosperous Anglo-American family in Torquay on 15 September 1890 and
named Agatha Mary Clarissa by her parents, Frederick and Clara (nee
Boehmer) Miller.
Acquires the name by
which she becomes world famous in 1914 through her Christmas Eve
marriage in Bristol to Clifton College graduate Archie Christie, a
career soldier and qualified pilot already embroiled in ‘The Great
War’.
As her war effort,
Agatha becomes a Torquay hospital volunteer and so meets the Belgian
refugees who are to influence the character of Hercule Poirot and
gains, though her pharmacy duties, a basic knowledge of potions and
poisons.
The first Agatha
Christie crime novel The Mysterious Affair at Styles is published in
1920 and features the debut of Hercule Poirot.
Another 80 Agatha
Christie crime novels and short story collections then follow, along
with six romances published under the name Mary Westmacott.
In 1928 she and
Archie Christie divorce and she subsequently meets and marries the
archaeologist Max Mallowan, later Sir Max Mallowan. In 1938 they buy
Greenway House, near Brixham, as a holiday retreat and it remains in
family hands until 1999 when passes into the care of the National
Trust.
During the Second
World War, Max’s knowledge of Arabia sees him posted to North
Africa while Agatha volunteers for pharmacy duties at University
College, London.
On 21 September
1943, Agatha becomes a grandmother when her only child Rosalind –
the daughter of Archie Christie and married to Hubert Prichard –
gives birth to a son, Mathew.
In 1971, Agatha is
made a Dame Commander of the British Empire, with the result that she
and Max become one of the very few married couples in which both
partners have earned a knightly honour in their own right.
Today’s estimate
is that more than 2 billion of her books have been sold worldwide,
making her the world’s best-selling author, out-ranked only by the
works of Shakespeare and The Holy Bible.
Agatha Christie is
also the world’s most translated novelist, with her books appearing
in 100+ languages, according to UNESCO. She is also the most
successful woman playwright.
Her play The
Mousetrap holds the world record for the longest running theatre
show, having opened in London’s West End in 1952 and still playing
there, more than 25,000 performances later.
Agatha Christie dies
on 12 January 1976, aged 85, and is buried in Oxfordshire.
The last book she
writes is Posterns of Fate, a Tommy and Tuppence story, published in
1973 but it is followed into bookshops by Curtain, the last case of
Hercule Poirot (1975) and by a final Miss Marple mystery, Sleeping
Murder (1976) – both written more than 30 years earlier but held
back in accordance with the author’s wishes.
Very many Christie
stories have been made into films or television dramas and this year
the number will rise even higher with the BBC making a new version of
And Then There Were None and screening Partners in Crime, a series
based on the Tommy and Tuppence stories and starring David Walliams
and Jessica Raine.
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