Being Poirot Page #3

My voice is coming up

from my emotions.

Now it is in my mouth, now it is

going higher, higher in my brain.

I will put on his Belgian French

accent

(AS POIROT) and then I will speak

as Hercule Poirot.

Chief Inspector, you ought

to look to your elocution.

Swipe me, nothing wrong

with my lingo.

'But something was still missing.

I went back to the books and found

the final piece of the jigsaw.

His walk.'

(READS) Poirot crossed the lawn

with his usual rapid, mincing gait

within his patent leather boots.

Having found that, of course...

..I then had to learn how to do it.

And that's the walk that became

synonymous with my Poirot.

Whitehaven Mansions, if you please.

'The same level of care went

into the whole look

of the television series.

Here, in London's

Charterhouse Square,

the production team found the

exterior location for Poirot's home.'

I really do love coming here.

This is, of course,

where Poirot lived.

The name of the block in the book

is Whitehaven Mansions.

And he chose this particular

block of flats

not because of its location

or anything

but because it's symmetrical.

And that, for Poirot,

was la creme de la creme.

'I've come here to meet Poirot's

first producer...'

David, how wonderful to see you!

'..Brian Eastman.'

Well, this is so strange

because I don't know whether

I'm coming back into one of our sets

or the real place

and of course,

this was the real place.

But the set was based on it,

wasn't it? Yeah.

Well, it was a decision, wasn't it,

to have everything set in the '30s?

Yes, cos she wrote the Poirot novels

over a period of about 60 years.

And I felt that it was very

important for a television show

that we should be rooted

in one particular era.

And in the end, I thought,

"Well, I'm actually going to root

them all in one particular year."

Dress them like 1936.

Of course, this isn't our flat

in the set.

This is the real flat

in this building.

We used the outside.

Which one was it?

Well, I remember we always used

to count down from the top.

One, two, three.

It's that one with the vertical

blinds. I think that was the one.

Mr Poirot? Mr Poirot?

Yes, Miss Lemon, yes?

There's a letter, sir,

from Eliza Dunn.

There!

BRIAN:
And the wonderful thing

that I felt that you did

was you managed to capture

the peculiarities

alongside the lovability.

And I think that is why people

love him.

But I had a wonderful team of actors

around me, didn't I?

I was able to play off them

and they were able to have their own

lives and their own worlds.

Good heavens!

Hugh Fraser as Captain Hastings.

Hastings, you think,

"Oh, he's a bit of a dunderhead."

And maybe he isn't the brightest

but Hugh brought

a fantastic intelligence

to a man who apparently

didn't have much.

Right.

Hastings.

Japp.

And Inspector Japp, Philip Jackson,

who is always bested by Poirot.

Right, who's the victim?

And Miss Lemon...Pauline Moran...

just brought that beautiful

eccentricity to it.

Abduction. Addiction.

Adultery, see also under 'marriage'.

Bigamy, see also under 'marriage'.

Bombs.

See also under 'marriage'?

I know from the mail I get and from

how people react to the series,

it's not just me,

it's the whole look.

It's production values,

the props, the locations.

And I couldn't have been given

a better place to live

for the man I played.

'There was one other element

that played a crucial role

in creating the mood of the series.'

It's great to see you.

'I've come to meet composer

Christopher Gunning.'

If I just hum...

(HUMS POIROT THEME)

..they say, "Poirot".

But you know, David,

one of many extraordinary things

was that I presented Brian Eastman

with four different tunes.

And he rang up the next day

and he said,

"Well, I've listened

to all four of them

and number four is my favourite."

Wow.

And I was mighty disappointed

because number one was mine.

Why do you think I put number one

at the beginning?

Yes. And I can still remember it,

actually. It went like -

(SOMBRE TUNE)

DAVID:
Yes, I have heard that.

(HUMS)

It went something like that.

And that was my clear favourite

but Brian didn't even get that

a thought.

And of course, he was right

and I was wrong.

How did you decide that should be one

of your theme tunes for Poirot?

What is the process for you?

I did read a script, so I thought

about what sort of music

would take us back to the '30s

a little bit.

(PLAYS VERSION OF POIROT THEME)

And I phoned Brian and asked him

and he said,

"No, I'm getting terribly negative

reactions to the music, Christopher.

We're going to have to start again."

So what I did was to darken it all

and I moved it into G minor,

so the alto saxophone

could now play it...

(PLAYS OPENING NOTES)

..in that register, and the

accompaniment could be down here.

(PLAYS LOWER NOTES)

Immediately, it has a sort of

gravitas that it didn't have

when I was fiddling around up there.

Yeah.

'That music, along with many other

elements, defines the series.

But what made Poirot such a popular

character around the world?

Where better to find out than

visiting the country of his birth -

Belgium?'

Pity Emily couldn't come.

Still, I think she's right.

Brussels is a far cry from

Isleworth.

Her loss is my gain.

'Hercule Poirot is not simply a

legend in Agatha Christie's homeland.

The Poirot films have been seen

in over 100 countries.'

(DUBBED INTO FRENCH)

'Over the years, I've received

thousands of letters

from all around the world.

Viewers might know my face

but not all have heard my voice.'

(DUBBED INTO GERMAN)

Hercule Poirot.

(SOBS)

'I had no idea Poirot would be so big

outside Britain.

Now I want to find out about his

international appeal

and where better to do so

than the country of his birth?'

'Ladies and gentlemen,

welcome aboard this service

to Lille and Brussels.'

One of the aspects that really

link us, Poirot and myself,

is that both of us are, in a way,

outsiders.

Although I was born in England,

most of my family on my father's side

were from Lithuania.

I certainly don't look like

a typical Englishman.

And that was Poirot as well.

In all the stories,

he's portrayed very vividly

but we know very little about his

past.

We know that he came to England

retired,

head of the Brussels police force,

but we know very little about

when he was a policeman there.

Well, Poirot, how does it feel

being back in Brussels again

after so many years?

In the eye of my mind,

Chief Inspector, I have never left.

Wow! Here we are.

Most beautiful square in the world.

Ah! It's fantastic. Look at it.

The Grand Square in Brussels.

I can actually remember filming here

The Chocolate Box

and yeah, I played chess in this

square. I remember that.

'The Chocolate Box

was the only Poirot story

that took us back to his past

as a police officer in Brussels.'

Checkmate.

'It's told in flashback,

so I had to lose over 20 years,

with the clever help of make-up

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