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Black Coffee (play)
Encyclopedia
Black Coffee is a play
by the British crime-fiction author Agatha Christie
(1890–1976) which was produced initially in 1930. The first piece that Christie wrote for the stage, it launched a successful second career for her as a playwright.
Twenty-two years after Christie's death, Black Coffee was re-published in the United Kingdom and the United States in the form of a novel. The novelisation was undertaken by the Australian-born writer and classical music critic Charles Osborne
, with the endorsement of the Christie estate.
in the previous year's play Alibi
, and being equally dissatisfied with the motion-picture adaptations of her short story The Coming of Mr. Quin and her novel The Secret Adversary
as The Passing of Mr. Quin
and Die Abenteurer GmbH. According to the foreword to the current HarperCollins
edition of Black Coffee in its novelised form, she finished writing the play in late 1929.
She mentions Black Coffee in her 1977 life story, Autobiography
, describing it as "a conventional spy thriller ... full of cliches, it was, I think, not at all bad". Nonetheless, her literary agents had advised her to forget the play entirely and she was willing to do so until a friend connected with the theatre suggested that it might be worth producing.
Christie's autobiography claimed that the debut performance of Black Coffee took place at the Everyman Theatre
in Hampstead
. However, no record exists of such a staging and she was undoubtedly confusing it with the true opening production at the Embassy Theatre
in Swiss Cottage (now London's Central School of Speech and Drama
) on December 8, 1930. The production ran in that theatre only until December 20. On April 9, 1931 it re-opened at the St Martin's Theatre
(later to be the second home of Christie's most enduring stage work The Mousetrap
), where it ran until May 1 before transferring to the Wimbledon Theatre on May 4. It then went to the Little Theatre on May 11, finally closing there on June 13, 1931.
Poirot was played initially by the well-known character actor Francis L. Sullivan
who became a good friend of the author. She approved of his portrayal despite the fact that physically he was far too tall for the dapper little Belgian detective. (Sullivan stood six feet, two inches in height.) Also in the premiere cast was (Sir) Donald Wolfit
, playing Dr. Carelli. Wolfit would become renowned in England as an actor-manager, best remembered for his vivid interpretations of Shakespearean roles and other big-scale classical parts.
Unlike most other Christie plays, Black Coffee did not transfer to the New York
stage.
ACT I
ACT II
ACT III
and his friend Arthur Hastings
are summoned to visit a famous physicist, Sir Claud Amory, but they discover on their arrival that he has been murdered. The plot revolves around a stolen formula, with Poirot deducing which of Sir Claud's house guests/family members is the killer.
reviewed the work in its issue of December 9, 1930, saying that, "Mrs Christie steers her play with much dexterity; yet there are times when it is perilously near the doldrums. Always it is saved by Hercule Poirot, the great French [sic] detective, who theorizes with the gusto of a man for whom the visible world hardly exists. He carries us with him, for he does not take himself too seriously, and he salts his shrewdness with wit. For a ruthless investigator he is an arrant sentimentalist; but that is one of the ways in which Mrs Christie prevents her problem from becoming tedious. Mr Sullivan is obviously very happy in the part, and his contribution to the evening's entertainment is a considerable one. Mr Boxer Watsonizes
pleasantly, and Miss Joyce Bland, as a young lady who must wait until the very end before knowing a moment's happiness, contrives to excite our sympathy for her distress. The remainder of the cast is rather serviceable than exciting."
The Observer
s issue of December 14, 1930 contained a review by "HH" in which he concluded that, "Miss Agatha Christie is a competent craftsman, and her play, which is methodically planned and well carried out and played, agreeably entertains."
The Guardian
reviewed the play in its issue of April 10, 1931. The reviewer stated that, "Miss Christie knows the ropes, keeps to the track, sets her Herculean protector in defence of innocence, and unmasks the real villain at eleven o’clock. One must be something of a ritualist to find enchantment in such matters. Mr. Francis Sullivan makes a large, guttural, amiable sleuth of the sagacious Hercules [sic]. He is wise not to imitate Mr. Charles Laughton
who gave us such a brilliant study of the Belgian some time ago. He makes his own portrait and does it with a competent hand." The reviewer praised others in the cast by name and concluded, "the company conduct themselves with a proper sense of the ceremonial involved in a detective play. But it is surely permissible to be surprised that adult people can be found in fairly large numbers to sit undismayed through the execution of such ritual as this."
Two days later, Ivor Brown
reviewed this second production in The Observer
when he said that, "If you are one of those playgoers who are eternally excited by a corpse in the library and cross-examination of the family, all is well. If not, not. To me the progress of detection seemed rather heavy going, but I start with some antipathy to murdered scientists and their coveted formulae. Black coffee is supposed to be a strong stimulant and powerful enemy of sleep. I found the title optimistic. "
The Times reviewed the play again when it opened at the Little Theatre in its issue of May 13, 1931. This time it said that, "Its false scents are made for the triumph of the omniscient Belgian detective, complete according to the best tradition with unintelligent foil; and if they appear sometimes to be manufactured with a little too much determination and to be revived when they seem most likely to be dissipated, they may be allowed because they just succeed in maintaining our sympathy with distressed beauty and our interest in the solution of a problem. Though much of the dialogue is stilted, the complacent detective has an engaging manner."
Cast of December 1930 production:
Francis L. Sullivan as Hercule Poirot
Donald Wolfit
as Dr. Carelli
Josephine Middleton as Miss Caroline Amory
Joyce Bland as Lucia Amory
Lawrence Hardman as Richard Amory
Judith Menteath as Barbara Amory
André van Gyseghem
as Edward Amory
Wallace Evennett as Sir Claud Amory
John Boxer as Captain Arthur Hastings
Richard Fisher as Inspector Japp
Cast of 1931 production:
Francis L. Sullivan as Hercule Poirot
Josephine Middleton as Miss Caroline Amory
Dino Galvani as Dr. Carelli
Jane Milligan as Lucia Amory
Randolph McLeod as Richard Amory
Renee Gadd as Barbara Amory
Walter Fitzgerald
as Edward Amory
E. Vivian Reynolds as Sir Claud Amory
Roland Culver as Captain Arthur Hastings
Neville Brook as Inspector Japp
The play was first published by Alfred Ashley and Son during November 1934. It was republished with minor revisions by Samuel French Ltd on July 1, 1952. This followed a successful revival in repertory
.
Like The Unexpected Guest
(1999) and Spider's Web
, the script of the play was turned into a novel by Charles Osborne. The novelisation was copyrighted in 1997 and published in 1998.
Black Coffee's resurrection as a novel was not its first significant reworking, however. It had been adapted into a motion picture, also entitled Black Coffee
, way back in 1931. Running to 78 minutes, the motion picture was produced by Julius S. Hagan and released on August 19, 1931 by Twickenham Film Studios. Austin Trevor played the role of Poirot in the motion picture. A few months earlier, he had played the same character in a screen version of the Alibi, made by the same film studio. (Alibi was an adaptation of Christie's classic whodunnit, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
.)
In 1932, the play was filmed again, this time by Les Établissements Jacques Haïk in France. Opening in cinemas as Le Coffret de laque on July 15, 1932, it was the first non-English language treatment of a Christie work. It was released internationally as The Lackered Box.
Play (theatre)
A play is a form of literature written by a playwright, usually consisting of scripted dialogue between characters, intended for theatrical performance rather than just reading. There are rare dramatists, notably George Bernard Shaw, who have had little preference whether their plays were performed...
by the British crime-fiction author Agatha Christie
Agatha Christie
Dame Agatha Christie DBE was a British crime writer of novels, short stories, and plays. She also wrote romances under the name Mary Westmacott, but she is best remembered for her 66 detective novels and 14 short story collections , and her successful West End plays.According to...
(1890–1976) which was produced initially in 1930. The first piece that Christie wrote for the stage, it launched a successful second career for her as a playwright.
Twenty-two years after Christie's death, Black Coffee was re-published in the United Kingdom and the United States in the form of a novel. The novelisation was undertaken by the Australian-born writer and classical music critic Charles Osborne
Charles Osborne (music writer)
Charles Thomas Osborne, born 24 November 1927 in Brisbane, Australia, is a journalist, critic, poet and novelist, and a recognised authority on opera. He was assistant editor of The London Magazine from 1958 until 1966, literature director of the Arts Council of Great Britain from 1971 until 1986,...
, with the endorsement of the Christie estate.
Writing and production
Agatha Christie began writing Black Coffee in 1929, feeling disappointed with the portrayal of Hercule PoirotHercule Poirot
Hercule Poirot is a fictional Belgian detective created by Agatha Christie. Along with Miss Marple, Poirot is one of Christie's most famous and long-lived characters, appearing in 33 novels and 51 short stories published between 1920 and 1975 and set in the same era.Poirot has been portrayed on...
in the previous year's play Alibi
Alibi (play)
Alibi is a 1928 play by Michael Morton based on The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, a novel by British crime writer Agatha Christie.It opened at the Prince of Wales Theatre in London's West End on May 15, 1928, starring Charles Laughton as Hercule Poirot. It was deemed a success and ran for 250...
, and being equally dissatisfied with the motion-picture adaptations of her short story The Coming of Mr. Quin and her novel The Secret Adversary
The Secret Adversary
The Secret Adversary is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie and first published in the United Kingdom by The Bodley Head in January 1922 and in the United States by Dodd, Mead and Company later in that same year. The UK edition retailed at seven shillings and sixpence and the US edition...
as The Passing of Mr. Quin
The Passing of Mr. Quinn
The Passing of Mr. Quin is a 1928 British mystery film which was co-directed by Leslie S. Hiscott and Julius Hagen, starring Clifford Heatherley, Mary Brough and Ursula Jeans. The film was based on the short story The Coming of Mr. Quin, part of the collection The Mysterious Mr. Quin, which was...
and Die Abenteurer GmbH. According to the foreword to the current HarperCollins
HarperCollins
HarperCollins is a publishing company owned by News Corporation. It is the combination of the publishers William Collins, Sons and Co Ltd, a British company, and Harper & Row, an American company, itself the result of an earlier merger of Harper & Brothers and Row, Peterson & Company. The worldwide...
edition of Black Coffee in its novelised form, she finished writing the play in late 1929.
She mentions Black Coffee in her 1977 life story, Autobiography
Agatha Christie: An Autobiography
An Autobiography is the title of the recollections of crime writer Agatha Christie published posthumously by Collins in the UK and by Dodd, Mead & Company in the US in November 1977, almost two years after the writer’s death in January 1976. The UK edition retailed at £7.95 and the US edition at...
, describing it as "a conventional spy thriller ... full of cliches, it was, I think, not at all bad". Nonetheless, her literary agents had advised her to forget the play entirely and she was willing to do so until a friend connected with the theatre suggested that it might be worth producing.
Christie's autobiography claimed that the debut performance of Black Coffee took place at the Everyman Theatre
Everyman Cinema, Hampstead
The Everyman, in Hampstead, London, England opened as a cinema on 26 December 1933.The building was first opened as the Hampstead Drill Hall and Assembly Rooms in the 1880s...
in Hampstead
Hampstead
Hampstead is an area of London, England, north-west of Charing Cross. Part of the London Borough of Camden in Inner London, it is known for its intellectual, liberal, artistic, musical and literary associations and for Hampstead Heath, a large, hilly expanse of parkland...
. However, no record exists of such a staging and she was undoubtedly confusing it with the true opening production at the Embassy Theatre
Embassy Theatre (London)
The Embassy Theatre is a theatre at 64, Eton Avenue, Swiss Cottage, London.- Early years :The Embassy Theatre was opened as a repertory company in September 1928 on the initiative of Sybil Arundale and Herbert Jay., when the premises of Hampstead Conservatoire of Music were adapted by architect...
in Swiss Cottage (now London's Central School of Speech and Drama
Central School of Speech and Drama
The Central School of Speech and Drama was founded in London in 1906 by Elsie Fogerty to offer a new form of training in speech and drama for young actors and other students...
) on December 8, 1930. The production ran in that theatre only until December 20. On April 9, 1931 it re-opened at the St Martin's Theatre
St Martin's Theatre
St Martin's Theatre is a West End theatre, located in West Street, near Charing Cross Road, in the London Borough of Camden. It was designed as one of a pair of theatres with the Ambassadors Theatre by W.G.R...
(later to be the second home of Christie's most enduring stage work The Mousetrap
The Mousetrap
The Mousetrap is a murder mystery play by Agatha Christie. The Mousetrap opened in the West End of London in 1952, and has been running continuously since then. It has the longest initial run of any play in history, with over 24,500 performances so far. It is the longest running show of the modern...
), where it ran until May 1 before transferring to the Wimbledon Theatre on May 4. It then went to the Little Theatre on May 11, finally closing there on June 13, 1931.
Poirot was played initially by the well-known character actor Francis L. Sullivan
Francis L. Sullivan
Francis Loftus Sullivan was an English film and stage actor. He attended Stonyhurst, the Jesuit public school in Lancashire, England whose alumni include Charles Laughton and Arthur Conan Doyle.A heavily built man with a striking double-chin and a deep voice, Sullivan made his acting debut at the...
who became a good friend of the author. She approved of his portrayal despite the fact that physically he was far too tall for the dapper little Belgian detective. (Sullivan stood six feet, two inches in height.) Also in the premiere cast was (Sir) Donald Wolfit
Donald Wolfit
Sir Donald Wolfit, KBE was a well-known English actor-manager.-Biography:Wolfit, who was "Woolfitt" at birth was born at New Balderton, near Newark-on-Trent, Nottinghamshire and attended the Magnus Grammar School and made his stage début in 1920...
, playing Dr. Carelli. Wolfit would become renowned in England as an actor-manager, best remembered for his vivid interpretations of Shakespearean roles and other big-scale classical parts.
Unlike most other Christie plays, Black Coffee did not transfer to the New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
stage.
Synopsis of scenes
The scene is laid in the library at Abbot's Cleve, Sir Claud Amory's house, about 25 miles from London.ACT I
- 8.30pm
ACT II
- The following morning
ACT III
- Fifteen minutes later
Plot
Hercule PoirotHercule Poirot
Hercule Poirot is a fictional Belgian detective created by Agatha Christie. Along with Miss Marple, Poirot is one of Christie's most famous and long-lived characters, appearing in 33 novels and 51 short stories published between 1920 and 1975 and set in the same era.Poirot has been portrayed on...
and his friend Arthur Hastings
Arthur Hastings
Captain Arthur Hastings, OBE, is a fictional character, the amateur sleuthing partner and best friend of Agatha Christie's Belgian detective, Hercule Poirot...
are summoned to visit a famous physicist, Sir Claud Amory, but they discover on their arrival that he has been murdered. The plot revolves around a stolen formula, with Poirot deducing which of Sir Claud's house guests/family members is the killer.
Reception
The TimesThe Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
reviewed the work in its issue of December 9, 1930, saying that, "Mrs Christie steers her play with much dexterity; yet there are times when it is perilously near the doldrums. Always it is saved by Hercule Poirot, the great French [sic] detective, who theorizes with the gusto of a man for whom the visible world hardly exists. He carries us with him, for he does not take himself too seriously, and he salts his shrewdness with wit. For a ruthless investigator he is an arrant sentimentalist; but that is one of the ways in which Mrs Christie prevents her problem from becoming tedious. Mr Sullivan is obviously very happy in the part, and his contribution to the evening's entertainment is a considerable one. Mr Boxer Watsonizes
John Watson (Sherlock Holmes)
John H. Watson, M.D. , known as Dr. Watson, is a character in the Sherlock Holmes stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Watson is Sherlock Holmes's friend, assistant and sometime flatmate, and is the first person narrator of all but four stories in the Sherlock Holmes canon.-Name:Doctor Watson's first...
pleasantly, and Miss Joyce Bland, as a young lady who must wait until the very end before knowing a moment's happiness, contrives to excite our sympathy for her distress. The remainder of the cast is rather serviceable than exciting."
The Observer
The Observer
The Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...
s issue of December 14, 1930 contained a review by "HH" in which he concluded that, "Miss Agatha Christie is a competent craftsman, and her play, which is methodically planned and well carried out and played, agreeably entertains."
The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
reviewed the play in its issue of April 10, 1931. The reviewer stated that, "Miss Christie knows the ropes, keeps to the track, sets her Herculean protector in defence of innocence, and unmasks the real villain at eleven o’clock. One must be something of a ritualist to find enchantment in such matters. Mr. Francis Sullivan makes a large, guttural, amiable sleuth of the sagacious Hercules [sic]. He is wise not to imitate Mr. Charles Laughton
Charles Laughton
Charles Laughton was an English-American stage and film actor, screenwriter, producer and director.-Early life and career:...
who gave us such a brilliant study of the Belgian some time ago. He makes his own portrait and does it with a competent hand." The reviewer praised others in the cast by name and concluded, "the company conduct themselves with a proper sense of the ceremonial involved in a detective play. But it is surely permissible to be surprised that adult people can be found in fairly large numbers to sit undismayed through the execution of such ritual as this."
Two days later, Ivor Brown
Ivor Brown
Ivor John Carnegie Brown was a British journalist and man of letters.-Biography:Born in Penang, Malaya, Brown was the younger of two sons of Dr. William Carnegie Brown, a specialist in tropical diseases, and his wife Jean Carnegie. At an early age he was sent to Britain, where he attended Suffolk...
reviewed this second production in The Observer
The Observer
The Observer is a British newspaper, published on Sundays. In the same place on the political spectrum as its daily sister paper The Guardian, which acquired it in 1993, it takes a liberal or social democratic line on most issues. It is the world's oldest Sunday newspaper.-Origins:The first issue,...
when he said that, "If you are one of those playgoers who are eternally excited by a corpse in the library and cross-examination of the family, all is well. If not, not. To me the progress of detection seemed rather heavy going, but I start with some antipathy to murdered scientists and their coveted formulae. Black coffee is supposed to be a strong stimulant and powerful enemy of sleep. I found the title optimistic. "
The Times reviewed the play again when it opened at the Little Theatre in its issue of May 13, 1931. This time it said that, "Its false scents are made for the triumph of the omniscient Belgian detective, complete according to the best tradition with unintelligent foil; and if they appear sometimes to be manufactured with a little too much determination and to be revived when they seem most likely to be dissipated, they may be allowed because they just succeed in maintaining our sympathy with distressed beauty and our interest in the solution of a problem. Though much of the dialogue is stilted, the complacent detective has an engaging manner."
Credits of London production
Director: André van GyseghemCast of December 1930 production:
Francis L. Sullivan as Hercule Poirot
Donald Wolfit
Donald Wolfit
Sir Donald Wolfit, KBE was a well-known English actor-manager.-Biography:Wolfit, who was "Woolfitt" at birth was born at New Balderton, near Newark-on-Trent, Nottinghamshire and attended the Magnus Grammar School and made his stage début in 1920...
as Dr. Carelli
Josephine Middleton as Miss Caroline Amory
Joyce Bland as Lucia Amory
Lawrence Hardman as Richard Amory
Judith Menteath as Barbara Amory
André van Gyseghem
Andre Van Gyseghem
André van Gyseghem was an English actor and theatre director who also appeared in many British television programmes.- Early life :...
as Edward Amory
Wallace Evennett as Sir Claud Amory
John Boxer as Captain Arthur Hastings
Arthur Hastings
Captain Arthur Hastings, OBE, is a fictional character, the amateur sleuthing partner and best friend of Agatha Christie's Belgian detective, Hercule Poirot...
Richard Fisher as Inspector Japp
Cast of 1931 production:
Francis L. Sullivan as Hercule Poirot
Josephine Middleton as Miss Caroline Amory
Dino Galvani as Dr. Carelli
Jane Milligan as Lucia Amory
Randolph McLeod as Richard Amory
Renee Gadd as Barbara Amory
Walter Fitzgerald
Walter Fitzgerald
Walter Fitzgerald was an English character actor.Born Walter Fitzgerald Bond in Keyham, Devon. Married 1st Rosalie Constance Grey in 1924.1s .2nd Angela Kirk in 1938. 3 sons 1 daughter....
as Edward Amory
E. Vivian Reynolds as Sir Claud Amory
Roland Culver as Captain Arthur Hastings
Neville Brook as Inspector Japp
Publication and further adaptations
Repertory
Repertory or rep, also called stock in the United States, is a term used in Western theatre and opera.A repertory theatre can be a theatre in which a resident company presents works from a specified repertoire, usually in alternation or rotation...
.
Like The Unexpected Guest
The Unexpected Guest (book)
The Unexpected Guest is a novelization by Charles Osborne of the 1958 play of the same name by crime fiction writer Agatha Christie and was first published in the UK by HarperCollins on September 6, 1999, and on October 1, 1999 in the US by St...
(1999) and Spider's Web
Spider's Web (book)
Spider's Web is a novelization by Charles Osborne of the 1954 play of the same name by crime fiction writer Agatha Christie and was first published in the UK by HarperCollins in September 2000 and on November 11, 2000 in the US by St...
, the script of the play was turned into a novel by Charles Osborne. The novelisation was copyrighted in 1997 and published in 1998.
Black Coffee's resurrection as a novel was not its first significant reworking, however. It had been adapted into a motion picture, also entitled Black Coffee
Black Coffee (1931 film)
Black Coffee is a 1931 British detective film directed by Leslie S. Hiscott, and based on the play Black Coffee by Agatha Christie featuring her famous private detective Hercule Poirot...
, way back in 1931. Running to 78 minutes, the motion picture was produced by Julius S. Hagan and released on August 19, 1931 by Twickenham Film Studios. Austin Trevor played the role of Poirot in the motion picture. A few months earlier, he had played the same character in a screen version of the Alibi, made by the same film studio. (Alibi was an adaptation of Christie's classic whodunnit, The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd
The Murder of Roger Ackroyd is a work of detective fiction by Agatha Christie, first published in the UK by William Collins & Sons in June 1926 and in the United States by Dodd, Mead and Company on the 19th of the same month. It features Hercule Poirot as the lead detective...
.)
In 1932, the play was filmed again, this time by Les Établissements Jacques Haïk in France. Opening in cinemas as Le Coffret de laque on July 15, 1932, it was the first non-English language treatment of a Christie work. It was released internationally as The Lackered Box.
External links
- Black Coffee at the official Agatha Christie website