Read Online Poirot and Me by David Suchet, Geoffrey Wansell - Free Book Online

to become forever
    intertwined in people’s minds, just as Basil
    Rathbone and Nigel Bruce were after those
    twelve wonderful black and white Hollywood
    adventures of Sherlock Holmes between
    1939 and 1946.
    Hugh was born in London but brought up
    in the Midlands, and is married to the actress
    Belinda Lang. He became a tremendous
    support to me, someone I could rely on
    every bit as much as Poirot did on his
    Hastings, and I think I helped him too. But it
    was very difficult for us to work out exactly
    what our relationship should be on the
    screen. It meant that we had to be very
    aware about exactly where we stood or sat
    in relation to the camera. In the end, we
    decided that I should almost always be in
    the foreground and he slightly behind, unless
    the story dictated otherwise.
    Quite rightly, Hugh didn’t want Hastings to
    be a comedy character – a straight man, if
    you like – because he thought, as I did, that
    his character was there to represent the
    audience in the story. That meant we had to
    find a way of making sure that Hastings was
    never allowed to look like a complete fool.
    To help him with this, Hugh developed a
    dead-pan expression to convey to the
    audience that Hastings was someone who
    may not have been hugely intelligent but
    nevertheless represented the ordinary man.
    As Hugh put it himself at the time, ‘One of
    Hastings’ functions is to elucidate what is
    going on in Poirot’s mind.’
    One way Hugh decided to do that was to
    use the phrases ‘Good heavens’ and ‘Good
    Lord’
    regularly,
    as
    a
    gently
    ironic
    commentary on his attitude to Poirot. Was
    he truly amazed? Or was he actually making
    fun of the great detective? Whatever the
    truth, it was a wonderful device, and it
    worked.
    The more upright and sensible Hastings
    became, the more it allowed me to
    accentuate
    Poirot’s
    foibles,
    the
    little
    mannerisms that I knew lay at the heart of
    his character. Hastings also gave me things
    to react against – like his love of his dark-
    green, open-top Lagonda car, for example,
    as well as his delight in the English
    countryside and sport, especially golf.
    Both the car and the countryside of the
    Lake District play their parts in The
    Adventure of the Clapham Cook, where
    Poirot amply displays his dislike of the
    ‘wasteland’ of the country on a trip to
    Keswick, by stepping in a cow pat and
    complaining that there is not one restaurant,
    theatre or art gallery in sight.
    It was Hugh who pointed out to me how
    much money was being lavished on the sets,
    props, costumes and background to make
    the production look authentic. We were
    walking across the Albert Bridge in Chelsea,
    on our way back from Mrs Todd’s house in
    Clapham, in a night scene, when Hugh said
    to me, when the cameras weren’t rolling,
    ‘Look, they’ve even got a camera crane. And
    have you seen how many vintage cars and
    passers-by dressed in exactly the right
    period clothes we have? It’s extraordinary.’
    He was quite right, but it was the first
    time that I had really noticed it, because I’d
    been so caught up in my portrayal of Poirot.
    No sooner had he pointed it out, however,
    than I became even more nervous, as I knew
    that it meant that a very great deal of
    money and expectations were resting on my
    shoulders. Later on, I discovered that London
    Weekend Television, who financed that first
    series for Brian Eastman, spent almost £5
    million on the filming of those first ten
    stories, an average of half a million pounds
    per episode, a fortune in 1988.
    Our first story not only allowed me to
    introduce some of Poirot’s idiosyncrasies, it
    also allowed me to show his finest qualities.
    His kindness to Mrs Todd’s parlour maid, for
    example, which leads him to the Lake
    District and the missing cook’s ‘inheritance’
    of an isolated cottage, his elaborate
    politeness to everyone he meets, and his
    habit of reading the Bible in bed every night.
    The Adventure of the Clapham Cook