Hickson Vs all the other Jane Marples

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  • I know it is up to me.

    I agree that I will not bring the topic up and if/when she asks, I will say "Thank you, I have watched them," and quickly change the subject.

  • glalonzo0408glalonzo0408 Pennsylvania, United States
    Keep them, and thank God that you have such a thoughtful friend....
  • I am keeping them and I am grateful.
  • Tommy_A_JonesTommy_A_Jones Gloucestershire, United Kingdom
    you could after a while sell them or give them to a charity shop, that is what I do sometimes when people give me something I really don't like, someone I know is quite often giving me a Book from an Author I don't like, I read the first 2 and then decided they weren't for me so when she bought me others from the same Author I either read them and then took them to a Charity Shop or Just took them to a Charity Shop depending on the Synopsis.
  • TuppenceBeresfordTuppenceBeresford Hertford, United Kingdom

    I am afraid I am not going to be liked for this but I really don't like Joan Hickson. I wish I did. I feel she is really the best because Agatha Christie believed she'd be a good Miss Marple but I just can't see it.

    1. Geraldine McEwan - I think Miss Marple has a real affection for good people, however much she despairs of the evil ones, and also a great sense of humour. I think Geraldine McEwan captures this brilliantly - I love the twinkle in her eye.

    2. Helen Hayes - I have only seen her in one film nearly 2 years ago and I can't remember quite why I liked her so much but I remember her as being warm, likeable and convincingly intelligent.

    3. Margaret Rutherford - I absolutely hated the idea of the Margaret Rutherford films but I'm embarrassed to admit I loved the film I saw. She's certainly not the real Miss Marple but she is a wonderful character.

    4. Julia McKenzie - I don't really feel this Miss Marple has the intelligence to solve murder mysteries that have baffled the police but she does make a good sweet old lady.

    5. Angela Lansbury - Again this was a long time ago but I found her quite boring and lifeless.

    6. Joan Hickson - I'm afraid I found her a bit cold and superior and distant from the characters. There was no affection in her manner that I could discern. I hope I haven't upset anyone. It can be really horrible when someone criticises an actor or character you love. Maybe I can learn to love her? I didn't like Geraldine McEwan at all the first few times I saw her but I do love her now.

  • Tommy_A_JonesTommy_A_Jones Gloucestershire, United Kingdom
    Isn't that interesting Tuppence, I am the total Opposite with Joan Hickson and Geraldine McKewan, I thought she was Hammy and I know this sounds Unfair to the Lady but I felt she was taking The Micky out of The Character, Her Portrayal for me lacked Sensitivity and, I heard suddenly after Auditioning alot of Actresses someone said why don't you get Geraldine McKewan, I wonder if that person had a Grudge against her and what you said about Julia McKenzie's Miss Marple I would attribute to Geraldine McKewan's. Helen Hayes was a Good Choice as an American Miss Marpe as was Angela Landesbury and The Margaret Rutherford Films were suitable of their time and I think Fun to watch now, Julia McKenzie was a bit better than Geraldine McKewan IMHO.
  • glalonzo0408glalonzo0408 Pennsylvania, United States

    I am afraid I am not going to be liked for this but I really don't like Joan Hickson. I wish I did. I feel she is really the best because Agatha Christie believed she'd be a good Miss Marple but I just can't see it.

    1. Geraldine McEwan - I think Miss Marple has a real affection for good people, however much she despairs of the evil ones, and also a great sense of humour. I think Geraldine McEwan captures this brilliantly - I love the twinkle in her eye.

    2. Helen Hayes - I have only seen her in one film nearly 2 years ago and I can't remember quite why I liked her so much but I remember her as being warm, likeable and convincingly intelligent.

    3. Margaret Rutherford - I absolutely hated the idea of the Margaret Rutherford films but I'm embarrassed to admit I loved the film I saw. She's certainly not the real Miss Marple but she is a wonderful character.

    4. Julia McKenzie - I don't really feel this Miss Marple has the intelligence to solve murder mysteries that have baffled the police but she does make a good sweet old lady.

    5. Angela Lansbury - Again this was a long time ago but I found her quite boring and lifeless.

    6. Joan Hickson - I'm afraid I found her a bit cold and superior and distant from the characters. There was no affection in her manner that I could discern. I hope I haven't upset anyone. It can be really horrible when someone criticises an actor or character you love. Maybe I can learn to love her? I didn't like Geraldine McEwan at all the first few times I saw her but I do love her now.

    Tuppence....I couldn't agree with you more......I thought I was the only one...
  • I loved  Margaret Rutherford, but then was hooked on Joan Hickson and I think because she was how I imagined her to be from the books - however as time passes, I find that  Julia McKenzie and Geraldine McEwan each bring their own unique qualities to the role.
  • The only one that did portray Miss Marple as described in the books was Joan Hickson in my opinion. I felt kind of let down when somebody else took over after her and could not bring myself to watch it. I got all the episodes on dvd played by Joan and feel happy with them.
  • Tommy_A_JonesTommy_A_Jones Gloucestershire, United Kingdom
    I think Visually Angela Landesbury was best which is why I would love Maggie Smith, Angela Thorne or Patricia Garwood (The Discontented Housewife) to play the role as to me they are similar but in terms of  mannerisms and personality Joan Hickson was much better by a long way.
  • Tommy_A_JonesTommy_A_Jones Gloucestershire, United Kingdom
    I thought Margaret Rutherford's Miss Marple was fun and nice to watch and Helen Hayes made a Good American Miss Marple as did Angela Landesbury
  • glalonzo0408glalonzo0408 Pennsylvania, United States
    What episode was Angela Landesbury Miss Marple?
  • Tommy_A_JonesTommy_A_Jones Gloucestershire, United Kingdom
    She was Miss Marple in The Mirror Crack'd
  • While Joan Hickson is certainly my ultimate Miss Marple, the movies are not even. As I commented before, I loved what they did with a Caribbean Holiday and Nemesis (adding human interest to the characters), and I loved the 4.50 from Paddington (though I was sorry they cut out the storyline of the real Martine, Stoddard-West's mother).  Incidentially, Lucy Eyelesbarrow was not at all what I imagined her, and yet she really worked for me in this version. I also liked A murder is announced. However, I really didn't like The moving finger - somehow, aside from the narrator, his sister. and the pastor's wife, the other characters aren't really convincing,The new version of The Moving finger was actually a bit better for me. I also didn't like Sleeping murder - Gwenda and Giles both seemed made of cardboard. I'm not sure whether my problem with these Hickson versions is due to poor acting or poor scripts, or just my own preference. But as Miss Marple, Joan Hickson is exactly right.
  • Tommy_A_JonesTommy_A_Jones Gloucestershire, United Kingdom
    The only 2 Joan Hickson Episodes I am not as keen on are Caribbean Mystery and They Do It With Mirrors, This however might be due to they 11th and 12th Favourite of the Miss Marple Novels for me, I do think to some extent there is a "British Black and White" approach to some of the Acting for instance the Actor who plays Giles in Sleeping Murder and The Calthorpe's in The Moving Finger and some of the Language at the Beginning when Miss Marple is talking to Dane about the Vicar being a Scholar and when Prof Wanstead is talking to The Vicar about Miss Marple he does sound Pompous as does Frederick Jaeger when he is Buttering Miss Marple up because he feels uncomfortable in The Body In The Library but I find the rest of those Episodes so Utterly Brilliant I don't mind, I recently watched again the ITV Versions of A Murder Is Announced, 4.50 From Paddington and The Moving Finger and apart can now watch those and to some extent enjoy them but I prefer the JH versions of Caribbean Murder and They Do It With Mirros to the ITV Versions of Nemesis and Sleeping Murder and JH is still my Favourite Miss Marple..
  • I think of all those that have played Miss Marple, Joan Hickson's version was the only one that convincing portrayed someone with "a mind like a bacon slicer"... behind a seemingly harmless, tenacious busybody persona.  
  • Hickson was great, she was made for the part of Marple 
  • LindaBoyleLindaBoyle Durham, United Kingdom
    My favourite by far is Joan Hickson , I loved her as Jane Marple brilliant acting.
  • I think Joan Hickson was the best Miss Marple. She had that kind of masculine brain which I think Miss Marple has in the novels, and which I think AC had. In her performances, the fluffy knitting just seemed like a facade she had to adopt because of the era into which she was born. I think that Joan Hickson was very good at moralising, and came across as if she was genuinely affected inside by the evil of the murders. In the Moving Finger, Miss Marple says, '..we are not put into this world, Mr Burton, to avoid danger when an innocent fellow-creature's life is at stake. You understand me?', and in Joan Hickson's portrayal, you really feel that she believed this, and saw herself as Nemesis, exposing and bringing justice to the wicked.

    Julia McKenzie was brilliant in A Pocket Full of Rye, at the end,  really, really moving - but more normal, and less uncanny than Joan Hickson.


  • edited May 2015
    I think Joan Hickson was the best Miss Marple. She had that kind of masculine brain which I think Miss Marple has in the novels, and which I think AC had. In her performances, the fluffy knitting just seemed like a facade she had to adopt because of the era into which she was born. I think that Joan Hickson was very good at moralising, and came across as if she was genuinely affected inside by the evil of the murders. In the Moving Finger, Miss Marple says, '..we are not put into this world, Mr Burton, to avoid danger when an innocent fellow-creature's life is at stake. You understand me?', and in Joan Hickson's portrayal, you really feel that she believed this, and saw herself as Nemesis, exposing and bringing justice to the wicked.


    Joan Hickson was very convincing as Miss Marple she was belevable. You believe every word that came out of Hickson's mouth. You know Agatha Christie told Hickson many, many years before she played the role that she would like Hickson to play Miss Marple. What interests me is what did Agatha see in Hickson to make her want to play Jane Marple? Hmmmm, something to think about
  • MikeUMikeU Ontario, Canada
    Joan Hickson is by far the closest to the Miss Marple described in Agatha Christie's books. I find it hard to watch the others after seeing Joan's portrayal of the character.
  • In the role of Miss Marple there is so much curiosity about human nature and how it discovers evil or good. There is so much reflection over the detail of daily life going on around her. She pretends to be personally affected by the doings of people in her village - eg, annoyed about the fish being delivered late, etc -  but  this is a smoke screen to disguise the fact that really she is a detached observer, on a completely different wavelength to most other people. In her, all the fine intellectual energy is focused inward to the world of the imagination. Interesting though I find the Geraldine Mckewan portrayl, and human, and spirited and consistent as I find Julia McKenzie's, these 'Marples' are just too outgoing and always socially making connections to make it believable that all that mental effort was going on on the inside. They seem a bit too aware of themselves, their comfort, and their own lives and goings on. They don't look like they are thinking deeply.

    The other thing is that Miss Marple is old-fashioned for her time. Geraldine McKewan's Marple is ahead of her time and flouts conventions. Julia McKenzie is, without a doubt, an excellently safe pair of hands and has done her utmost with the role, but didn't convey Victorian reserve. Interesting that in the novel A Pocket Full Of Rye, Miss Marple, when she turns up at the big house, is described as tall and seems quite vigorous. I always thought the bird wing on her hat seemed a bit cruel. In other novels,  the description is of a 'fluffy' person, and the knitting the babies' soft quilts all the time, intensifies this fluffiness idea. I think that in the late novels, Miss Marple changes again and seems to be expressing, I feel, some of the views about the modern age held by the author. I noted this in A Carribbean Mystery. There is a lot of her musing about people's views towards having affairs etc. There is a little bit more wryness and irony in the internal monologues than used to be there.
  • @Griselda: I think Joan Hickson both exemplifies as Miss Marple as a deep thinker and conveys Victorian reserve. I don't think anyone can or will ever play Miss Marple the way Hickson did. Almost a shame she never filmed the short stories, but at least she did all the novels and I'm glad about that
  • Yes, I was thinking that the novel 'Nemesis' gives the key to how Agatha Christie wanted us to view Miss Marple. She is a force for justice - and somehow greater than simply a shrewd old lady.

    I am eternally grateful that she did all the novels.

    On a different subject, ChristieFanForLife, would you happen to know, whether Poirot in 'Taken at the Flood' was made into a television film or episode? I don't think I've ever viewed it on the screen. (I am enjoying the characters on the re-read.)
  • Griselda, yes "Taken At The Flood" was made into an film with David Suchet but I didn't really care for it. The book is better.
  • Thank you, ChristieFanForLife.
  • I am running through the AcornTV stable of Miss Marple and must also agree. I am missing Hickson's understated eagle-eye portrayal so much...and her hard-as-nails references to so much evil in the bucolic English village.  The other portrayals' dotty-but-crafty-old-lady Marples also create a jarrinf and almost cartoonish rolling-eyed response from the assorted detectives. This unmannerly silliness (and forget about Rutherford!), really takes away from my enjoyment viewing the environment of small village life in 1940s-50s England. I have also been struck by the differences in writing between the many actresses' portrayals. While I enjoy Hickson's sharp portrayal in Nemesis, I have noticed the stronger representations of (perhaps) gay characters in the McKewan writing. The whole twisted mess with Verity in Nemesis is contained in the Hickson version as overzealous, perhaps closeted Lesbian sisters.  In the McKewan version, I believe they are actually nuns.  Heavens!  Similarly, there are gay characters in other far more obvious gay characters in the McKewan versions. Not in the Hickson versions, although her own performance is by far my favorite.   Fascinating comparisons.I'm really enjoying this discussion!
  • We have discussed the Gay issue in the past - sometimes the gay element is added in the later movies, even though it simply doesn't exist in the books! (SPOILER: see the end of "The body in the library", where the identity of the killer is changed in the movie to accomodate a lesbian relationship which doesn't exist at all in the book). AC was aware of homosexuality and mentioned it (e.g. the house sitter at the beginning of "A Caribbean Mystery) but as far as I know, never portrays a homosexual relationship, though in some cases female friendships may be lesbian (but never explicitly stated) e.g. the two young teachers in "Cat among the pigeons", or Hinchcliff and Murgatroyd in "A murder is announced".
  • Tali, see what you make of this description of Mrs Dacres's Young male friend: Three Act Tragedy, MannequinDoris Sims speaking to Egg Lyton Gore." Well, there's been a lot of talk among the girls. About a young fellow - very rich and very soft. Not exactly balmy, if you know what I mean - sort of betwixt and between. Madam's been running him for all she was worth."
  • Sounds to me more like an unbalanced young man than homosexual. "Madam's been running him..." sounds like she was having an affair with him in order to get money out of him.
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