Hercule Poirot isn’t just about those famous little grey cells, insists Michael Maloney who takes on the role of the celebrated Belgian sleuth on tour in Murder On The Orient Express.
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00:00Good morning, my name is Phil Hewitt, Group Arts Editor at Sussex Newspapers. This is
00:07the closest I'm ever going to get to Hercule Poirot. Lovely to speak to Michael Maloney
00:13on the road with Murder on the Orient Express. Dates coming up include the Mayflower, Southampton
00:19and also Brighton Theatre Royal. And goodness, we were talking about the weight and the expectation
00:26that comes with that role of Poirot. What do you do? You're saying it's all in the
00:30text that you need. Look, I think so. Look, you take all the information you can from
00:35the novels and it never stops. And also people come in with information that sometimes is
00:40conflicting. So you have to choose some piece of information and they're all correct. But
00:45the novels went on for much longer than expected. And so therefore, Poirot is a very ancient
00:50man and also a very young man, depending on the play that you're taking on board or the
00:55novel you're taking on board.
00:56Well, you could just say he's timeless, couldn't you?
00:58He's timeless. He is. He's absolutely timeless. And so that's my story and I'm sticking to
01:03it.
01:04Fair enough. And the point is that we've got to look at Poirot as a complex, real human
01:09being. He's not little grey cells. There's more to him than that, isn't there?
01:14Exactly that. Exactly that. And I think that this is a good invitation from Ken Ludwig,
01:18the adaptor of this stage play, playwright in his own right, to give us this opportunity.
01:25And you know, it will never be enough, I think. In this particular production, Poirot is humorous.
01:30He's dispassionate. He's passionate. He's angry. He loves or he understands love. And
01:38he has an incisive brain that disinterestedly picks apart the facts of this terrible case.
01:48And all those things go into it. And he suffers guilt. He suffers guilt from making his prognosis.
01:54And it really is a true prognosis one, isn't it? It's an absolutely complex end of Agatha
01:59Christie. Absolutely evil crime, isn't it?
02:05Yeah, it really is. And here comes the debate. Is the end justice or is it revenge? And people
02:13go out to the theatre talking about that, discussing about that. I'm glad that so-and-so
02:18got their comeuppance. Are you? But that's not justice. Are we going to have justice or are we
02:24going to take the law into our own hands? And that's terribly important. And there's a speech
02:28at the end of the play, by the way, which is, it is 1934. Europe is changing. There will be chaos.
02:34There will be tyranny. If we do not stand up for the law, we will be nothing left and we will have
02:39to start again. So it's quite topical, I think. Absolutely. Well, it's a fabulous play. Really
02:45look forward to seeing you in the role. Lovely to speak with you. And best wishes on the tour.
02:50Thank you very much. Thank you so much. Take care of yourselves. Thank you. Bye-bye.