Endless Night 

Miss Marple investigates the downfall of an optimistic young couple who ignored the warnings of a gypsy and built a dream home on allegedly cursed land.

Director:

David Moore

Writers:

Kevin Elyot (screenplay), Agatha Christie (novel)

Stars:

Julia McKenzie, Tom Hughes, Aneurin Barnard

Cast

Episode cast overview, first billed only:
Julia McKenzie	...	Miss Marple
Tom Hughes	...	Mike Rogers
Aneurin Barnard	...	Robbie Hayman
Adam Wadsworth	...	Pete Hayman
Joanna Vanderham	...	Ellie
Wendy Craig	...	Marjorie Phillpot
Janet Henfrey	...	Mrs. Lee
Tamzin Outhwaite	...	Mrs. Rogers
William Hope	...	Lippincott
Glynis Barber	...	Cora Van Stuyvesant
Michael McKell	...	Frank Stanford
Birgitte Hjort Sørensen	...	Greta Anderson
Hugh Dennis	...	Dr. Shaw
Rosalind Halstead	...	Claudia Hardcastle
Celyn Jones	...	Sergeant Keene

Storyline

While consoling her recently widowed friend Marjorie, Miss Marple crosses paths with the handsome Mike Rogers, a young worker with a penchant for daydreaming about his future, more specifically about the perfect house he would live in, built on the eerily beautiful Gypsy's Acre. When Mike meets and marries the ethereal American heiress Ellie Goodman, his luck changes, and with the help of his old friend and rising architect Robbie Hayman, Mike's dream house is finally built, despite the repeated warnings from Esther Lee, a local gypsy, that Gypsy's Acre is cursed ground. Miss Marple, however, senses that danger really is near at hand, especially when frightening incidents plague Mike and Ellie, culminating in an injury that leads to the arrival of Ellie's mysterious Swedish friend, Greta. But when Ellie herself meets a tragic end, Miss Marple and Mike are faced with a chilling reality: that, perhaps, supernatural nightmares truly can exist, and that - as William Blake once wrote - ...

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Plot Keywords:

gypsy | horse | dream house | architect | rich wife | 

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Genres:

Crime | Drama | Mystery

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Did You Know?

Trivia

The fortune the Gipsy tells, which includes the episode title "Endless Night," is actually just a section of the William Blake poem "Auguries of Innocence."

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Quotes

[first lines]
Pete Hayman: Mike, it's rubbish! Come look at this!
Pete Hayman: Hey, Mike.
Mike Rogers: What?
Pete Hayman: I'll race you.

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Crazy Credits

Watch the credits and you'll see some seemingly random red letters appear in the names of the crew. These letters spell out "Auguries of Innocence," a poem written by William Blake. Lines of this poem are spoken by Mrs. Lee and Miss Marple: "Every Night & every Morn Some to Misery are Born Every Morn and every Night Some are Born to sweet delight Some are Born to sweet delight Some are Born to Endless Night "

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Connections

Version of Endless Night (1972)

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Soundtracks

Half As Much
Written by Curly Williams
(uncredited)

User Reviews

Forget Miss Marple and savor a darker Christie

As another reviewer has suggested, it's best to watch the productions in this series simply as pieces of television, not as adaptations of the Miss Marple stories. As soon as one makes that shift, "Endless Night" begins to reward attention.

The Wikipedia article on the original story tells us that it was a critical success and one of Christie's own favorites among her works. It adds that the Marple adaptation for television was fairly faithful to the original. The dark, unsentimental, humorless tone of the TV production seems consistent with that view, even as it dashes the expectations raised by the rest of the Marple series.

If the story seems to move slowly, that's because it moves at the pace of serious drama, accumulating moral mass and developing character in a degree that Christie's light mystery puzzles lack. It does not leave us amused with murder. If anything, it leaves us thirsting for entertainment that will take away the bitter taste of a more honest response.

No attempt will be made here to summarize the plot or introduce the characters, with the exception of Miss Marple herself. Her insertion into this non-Marple story can be counted as two faults and two virtues. On the negative side, it slights the main character of the series and disturbs the mood of this particular story. On the positive side, it enabled the staff assembled for the Marple project to do the story in the first place. No Miss Marple, no production. It also has the interesting effect of casting a new light on Julia McKenzie's running performance in the series. The performance itself is consistent. But whereas McKenzie's earnest Jane Marple usually seems to represent genuine humanity among the denizens of a cartoon world, here she seems an allegorical figure coming and going in the real world: a Fury in human form or a Good Witch out of a fairy tale. The acting techniques that have always produced a refreshingly realistic effect now suggest the pat pseudo-realism of a dream. Instead of being a rock of sanity, Miss Marple becomes a rising tide of maddening truth.

However, the greatest virtue of this production is its visual quality. It achieves an unusually convincing period look and sometimes, especially in the interior shots of people interacting, recalls the plausible 1950s atmosphere of George Clooney's Good Night, and Good Luck (2005). At all events, it's a visual treat: comprehensively designed, directed, and photographed with superb taste. Many High Definition TV dramas, including latter-day Marple and Poirot productions, aggressively appeal to the eyes like animated coffee-table books. In contrast, "Endless Night" shuns gratuitously stunning tableaux in favor of a more deliberate, selective artistry in the use of color and tone. Yes, these images are often suitable for framing, but they function first of all as an appropriate narrative medium.

If you're willing to endure the unrelieved moral gloom of the story more than once, "Endless Night" does reward multiple viewings.

Details

Country:

UK USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

28 September 2014 (USA)

Also Known As:

Marple: Endless Night

Filming Locations:

Sidmouth, Devon, England, UK

Company Credits

Production Co:

ITV Studios, Masterpiece, Agatha Christie

Technical Specs

Runtime:

89 min

Color:

Color