Most people know that Agatha Christie wrote a number of plays, Murder on the Nile and Witness for the Prosecution being amongst the most famous. But Agatha also wrote many other lesser known vehicles including a twisty, nasty, one act play called The Rats. This is the play that the Grange Players of Walsall submitted to the recent AETF Awards, where it was awarded the best one-act play in Birmingham! They are now bringing the show to The Grange Stage for two nights only and I was able to attend the very first show.  (incidentally my first visit to The Grange Playhouse, but it won’t be my last.) I was…

Murder on the Nile is almost Death on the Nile. Almost, but not quite. For a start, there’s no Poirot. Agatha Christie, fed up with the early film and theatre portrayals of her little Belgium detective as a strapping six footer in need of a love interest, replaced Poirot with the kindly but very astute Cannon Pennefather. Linnet, the beautiful, incredibly spoilt heiress, is now Kay, still married to Simon, but now a Mostyn rather than a Doyle. Other characters have disappeared altogether, and have been replaced/merged for a more streamline cast. So, Murder on the Nile is almost Death on the Nile, the same but somehow different. Yet, as…