Angela Lansbury once said in an interview that one of the more exciting moments of her career was working with Bette Davis in Death on the Nile (1978).

That’s the movie I watched this week for my Summer of Angela feature.

The movie is full of A-list movie stars: Angela, Bette, David Niven, Maggie Smith, Mia Farrow, and, of course, Peter Ustinov as Hercule Poirot.

I’m not a fan of Ustinov as Poirot since David Suchet plays the part so brilliantly, and I can’t see anyone else as Poirot, but the movie is still okay overall. I only added it to my watch list because Angela is in it. I had fun watching her be absolutely over the top as an eccentric romance writer and Maggie Smith be an overall jerk throughout, which is a role that she seemed to always play well.

Mia Farrow was …er…creepy as always.

Let’s talk about the plot a little for those who aren’t familiar with this one from either the book by Agatha Christie or the movie.

The online description:

“On a luxurious cruise on the Nile River, a wealthy heiress, Linnet Ridgeway (Lois Chiles), is murdered. Fortunately, among the passengers are famed Belgian detective Hercule Poirot (Peter Ustinov) and his trusted companion, Colonel Race (David Niven), who immediately begin their investigation. But just as Poirot identifies a motley collection of would-be murderers, several of the suspects also meet their demise, which only deepens the mystery of the killer’s identity.”

Angela portrays an eccentric romance writer named Salome Otterbourne who based a character in one of her books on Linnet. She and Linnet confront each other on the boat and Linnet tells Salome she’s going to sue her for libel. Just about everyone on the boat seems to have an issue with Linnet, which makes me wonder how they all ended up on the boat together. Planned or just coincidence, I don’t know, but they all seem to know each other and Linnet is angry with just about everyone and they are angry with her.

Salome is on the boat with her daughter Rosalie who is embarrassed by her mother’s behavior.

Angela’s character isn’t in the movie as much as other characters, but when she is, she certainly fills the screen with her crazy personality and outfits.

She makes all kinds of semi-suggestive comments about possible couples or what people need to do to feel more relaxed. Some of the characters refer to her books as “lurid.”

At one point, she and her daughter talk about whether or not Poirot would know her from her books. Rosalie says, “Somehow, I don’t think Monsieur Poirot is a very keen reader of romantic novels, Mother.”

Mrs. Otterbourne responds: “Well, of course he is! All Frenchmen are. They’re not afraid of good, strong sex!”

She is such an obnoxious character that after the murder occurs David Niven’s character comments to Poirot: “What a perfectly dreadful woman. Why doesn’t somebody shoot her, I wonder?

Poirot responds, “Perhaps one day, the subscribers of the lending libraries will club together and hire an assassin.”

The film was shot on location in Egypt so many of the experiences the characters had were actually had by the actors and actresses. I think some of the reactions that were filmed when they were climbing on the donkeys and camels were totally adlibbed because they were so authentic and funny.

According to TCM, makers of the film were trying to cash in on the success of the 1974 film Murder on the Orient Express, also based on an Agatha Christie book. That cast was also star-studded with Lauren Bacall, Ingrid Bergman, and Anthony Perkins.

Unfortunately, while Murder on the Orient Express brought in $27.6 million, this movie only grossed $14.5 million in the U.S. and Canada. Despite the lackluster success at the time it was released, many Christie fans see it as one of the better adaptations of the book — at least according to the many comments about it that I read online.

One thing that might have made the movie less of a success was the filming locations.

TCM.com stated this in an article about the movie: “Despite the exotic locale, split between Egypt and London, filming conditions for the movie were less than ideal. Filmed on a little boat called The Carnock, the actors took a speedboat back and forth each day from their hotel in Aswan down river to the shooting location. The Carnock was also apparently too small for all the actors to have their own dressing rooms. One unpleasant incident involved Bette Davis, Olivia Hussey and some Eastern chant records Hussey liked to play early in the morning. After Davis asked Hussey not to play her music, it was reported that the actresses did not speak to each other again while aboard The Carnock. If tensions weren’t high enough, the temperature climbed well above 100 degrees everyday and filming often was halted at noon.”

What Angela said about the movie:

As I mentioned in the beginning of this post, Angela remembers what a delight it was to work with Bette Davis.

“She was a very fascinating woman,” Angela told Studio Canal. “I got to know her quite well on that occasion. She had been a great, great Warner Brothers star and I had been a fan of hers as a child. She was a great deal older than me and I remembered her and all her great roles.”

Angela remembered Bette as being a “special and unique” actress.

“Unique looking and sounding and I was delighted to meet her and work with her.”

Angela also reflected on working with Ustinov who was her ex-brother-in-law.

“My role was such an interesting, farcical character anyways and there was so much comedy involved,” she said. “David Niven and Peter Ustinov and myself and my husband and I, we were all great friends and knew each other from other times.”

As for the conditions, Angela confirmed that they were not very nice at times.

“We were billeted in a hotel in the middle of the Nile,” she said. “To get to it, we had to get on a boat, having to cross water. We all lived in this luxury hotel in the middle of the Nile in Egypt and that was a special and wonderful experience I would say. I mean you couldn’t have been more comfortable. Swimming pools, wonderful food, everything  you could possibly want and then we would get 4 or maybe 3 in the morning because of the heat at the time in Egypt. We had to do the shooting before noon. Otherwise, it would be too hot. So, we were dealing with that and also an old riverboat we were working on which was trundling its way down the Nile, pulled by little boats and sometimes under its own steam.”

The boat made so much noise, though, that it was often tugged along by the little boats, she said.

The only dressing room in the bottom of the boat in a four-bed cabin.

“It was a bed up and a bed down, so the fittings had to take place between the two beds,” Angela said. “I remember that Bette would lie down on one bunk and Maggie Smith was on the other and I was on the third. We would take turns being fitted in the ‘well’, in the middle. It was one of those extraordinary circumstances where we forced to not be the stars we were supposed to be.”

The costumes in this movie were amazing and were designed by Anthony Powell, who won an Oscar for his work on the film (the film’s only award). Angela had nothing but praise for him.

“My costumes on that film I thought were absolutely extraordinary and quite original and marvelous,” she said. “They were built in New York City by my friend Barbara Matera and he worked with her and we all worked together and we came up with this extraordinary look but Anthony was at the root of it all.”

I have to agree that her costumes were dazzling and something else. Not sure I’d ever wear them, but they fit her character for sure.

You can see the full interview here:

My thoughts:

I watched this one in pieces because it comes in at a whopping 2 hours and 20 minutes!! I didn’t remember it being that long when I first watched it with my husband, but, thinking back, I seem to remember we watched one half one night and the other half the next night.

While I did enjoy the movie, and watching Angela’s antics when she was on screen, the movie was really too long for my taste. I know they needed to take us down some twists and turns to keep us guessing but two and a half hours? Gah!

Also, what always gets me about these movies is how a bunch of people can die (the number of deaths in this one was excessive if you ask me and I’d like to read the book to see if Agatha wrote that many deaths) and at the end everyone just shrugs it off. I won’t give it away but there was one death in particular that just got waved off as no big deal at the end with the characters smiling and walking away arm in arm. So bizarre and left me wondering if the person they said killed that person wasn’t actually someone else.

In addition to Angela’s performance, I loved the witty and sarcastic banter between Maggie Smith and Bette Davis’ characters.

Maggie’s character, Miss Bowers, was supposed to be Bette’s nurse and companion. Bette portrayed Marie Van Schuyler, a socialite. Maggie was horrible to Bette’s character, though! It was sort of crazy but also hilarious. They had some of the best exchanges.

“Mrs. Van Schuyler: Come on, Bowers, time to go. This place is beginning to resemble a mortuary.

Miss Bowers: Thank God you’ll be in one yourself before too long, you bloody old fossil!

***

Mrs. Van Schuyler: Shut up, Bowers. Just because you’ve got a grudge against her, or rather her father, no need to be uncivil.

Miss Bowers: *Grudge*? Melhuish Ridgeway ruined my family!

Mrs. Van Schuyler: Well, you should be grateful. If he hadn’t, you would have missed out on the pleasure of working for me.

Miss Bowers: I could kill her on that score alone!

***

Mrs. Van Schuyler: How would a little trip down the Nile suit you?

Miss Bowers: There is nothing I would dislike more. There are two things in the world I can’t abide: it’s heat and heathens.

Mrs. Van Schuyler: Good. Then we’ll go. Bowers, pack.

Miss Bowers was definitely not a respectful employee, but I think that Mrs. Van Schuyler liked that.

One other observation: This movie seems to feature a lot of scenes of rich people sitting around in drawing rooms, all dressed up with nowhere to go. I’m very confused why they got all dressed up to sit around every night together and then just go to bed. Didn’t any of them own clothes that weren’t fancy? Of course, I’m teasing here because I really did love the outfits for the women. The dresses were all so eye-catching.

Trivia or Facts About the movie:

According to producer Richard Goodwin, Bette Davis brought her own make-up, mirrors, and lights to Egypt. (source IMdB)

Peter Ustinov was David Niven’s personal attendant during World War II. Ustinov was a private and Niven was a Lt. Colonel (various sources)

Location shooting in Egypt consisted of four weeks on the riverboat “S.S. Karnak” and three weeks filming in places such as Luxor, Cairo, Aswan, and Abu Simbel. (various sources)

Ustinov portrayed Poirot five more times. (various sources)

Albert Finney was initially asked to reprise his role as Poirot from Murder on the Orient Express (1974). However, he had found the make-up he had to wear for the first movie very uncomfortable in the hot interior of the train, and on realizing that he would have to undergo the same experience, this time in temperatures exceeding 100 degrees Fahrenheit (38 degrees Celsius), he declined the role. (source IMdB)

Angela Lansbury had never seen the finished film until she attended a 40th Anniversary screening on November 9, 2018.   (source IMdB)

Dancer Wayne Sleep, relatively unknown at the time, choreographed the tango scene. He reported in 2018, “I was being paid an hourly rate, which was great as nobody turned up to the rehearsal and I had to go and find David Niven and persuade him to come.” (source IMdB)

Producer John Brabourne said no telephones were available while on-location in Egypt. They had to communicate by telex. . (source IMdB)

Agatha Christie was inspired to write the source novel in 1937, during an Egyptian vacation. The hotel scenes were shot at the Old Cataract Hotel in Aswan, where Christie stayed. The hotel’s front had to be “redressed” to appear more 1930s, and the furniture on the hotel’s terrace was replaced with custom period-authentic pieces.  (source IMdB)

Notable quotes:

• Jacqueline De Bellefort: Simon was mine and he loved me, then *she* came along and… sometimes, I just want to put this gun right against her head, and ever so gently, pull the trigger. When I hear that sound more and more…
• Hercule Poirot: I know how you feel. We all feel like that at times. However, I must warn you, mademoiselle: Do not allow evil into your heart, it will make a home there.
• Jacqueline De Bellefort: If love can’t live there, evil will do just as well.
• Hercule Poirot: How sad, mademoiselle.

***

Mrs. Van Schuyler: [Remarking on Linnet’s pearls] Oh, they’re beautiful!

Linnet Ridgeway: Thank you.

Mrs. Van Schuyler: And extraordinary, if you know how they’re made. A tiny piece of grit finds it’s way into an oyster, which then becomes a pearl of great price, hanging ’round the neck, of a pretty girl like you.

Linnet Ridgeway: I never thought of it that way.

Mrs. Van Schuyler: Well, you should. the oyster nearly dies!

***

• Jim Ferguson (to Rosalie): Karl Marx said that religion was the opium of the people. For your mother, it’s obviously sex.

***

Miss Bowers: I think a shot of morphia will meet the case. I’ve always found it very effective when Mrs Van Schuyler is carrying on.

***

Mrs Otterbourne: I suppose that uncouth young man will appear now and attempt to seduce you. Well, don’t let him succeed without at least the show of a struggle. Remember, the chase is very important.

Rosalie Otterbourne: Oh, mother!

Mrs Otterbourne: I tell you that I, Salome Otterbourne, have succeeded where frail men have faltered. I am a finer sleuth than even the great Hercule Porridge.

Have you seen this one? What did you think?

Here is what is left of my Summer of Angela:

August 1 – The Court Jester

August 8 – The Picture of Dorian Gray

August 15 – A Life At Stake

August 22 – All Fall Down

August 29 – Something for Everyone

If you want to read about some of the other movies I watched you can find them here:

Bedknobs and Broomsticks

The Manchurian Candidate

National Velvet

The Pirates of Penzance

Gaslight

Please Murder Me

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Additional resources:

TCM.com

https://www.tcm.com/tcmdb/title/16698/death-on-the-nile/#articles-reviews?articleId=87814

Interview with Angela about the movie:

https://youtu.be/6vmY6_WMbeU?si=zZIs2jq3mVZGofZi

IMdB listing: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0077413/trivia/

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Lisa R. Howeler is a blogger, homeschool mom, and writes cozy mysteries.

You can find her Gladwynn Grant Mystery series HERE.

You can also find her on Instagram and YouTube.