 | Murder by Death: Encyclopedia II - Murder by Death - Cast of Characters
Murder by Death - Cast of Characters
The action of the movie takes place in and around the isolated country home of eccentric multi-millionaire Lionel Twain (Capote), inhabited by his blind butler, Jamesir Bensonmum (Alec Guinness) and a deaf-mute maid called Yetta (Nancy Walker). As the movie opens, our heroes, all pastiches of famous detectives, are approaching the house through dense, fog-bound forest, accompanied by their assistants or sidekicks; it emerges that they have been invited to "dinner and a murder", over a weekend at Twain's wacky mansion.
Sidney Wang, played by Peter Sellers, is based on Charlie Chan, and appropriately accompanied by his son Willie (Richard Narita). Wang wears elaborate Chinese costume, and his grammar is frequently criticised by the host.
Dick and Dora Charleston (David Niven and Maggie Smith) are polished, sophisticated society types modelled on Nick and Nora Charles from the Thin Man series of films. Their excellent breeding gets them out of a few scrapes during the course of the weekend.
Milo Perrier (James Coco) is a take on Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot, and arrives at the house with his chauffeur Marcel (James Cromwell, of Babe and L.A. Confidential fame). Portly Perrier is overly fond of food , and is annoyed that he must share a room with lowly Marcel.
Sam Diamond represents the hard-boiled American style of detective, perhaps most closely based on The Maltese Falcon's Sam Spade. Played by Peter Falk, he is ably assisted by Eileen Brennan as his loyal and efficient secretary, Tess Skeffington.
Christie's other great creation, Miss Marple, appears here as Jessica Marbles, played by Elsa Lanchester as a hearty, tweed-clad Englishwoman, with a frail, elderly companion, her "nurse" Miss Withers (a 93-year-old Estelle Winwood).
Other related archives1976, Babe, Thin Man, Agatha Christie, Alec Guinness, And Then There Were None, Breakfast at Tiffany's, Capote, Charlie Chan, Christie, David Niven, Eileen Brennan, Elsa Lanchester, Estelle Winwood, Hercule Poirot, James Coco, James Cromwell, L.A. Confidential, Maggie Smith, Miss Marple, Moore, Murder by Death (band), Nancy Walker, Neil Simon, Nick and Nora Charles, Peter Falk, Peter Sellers, Robert Moore, Sam Spade, Sherlock Holmes, Simon, The Cheap Detective, The Maltese Falcon, The Real Inspector Hound, Tom Stoppard, Truman Capote, farce, mystery fiction, red herrings, self-referential humour, slapstick, spoof, twist, whodunit, witty banter
 Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Cast of Characters", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki |
