Cover Her Face (Inspector Adam Dalgliesh Mystery)

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D. James mystery feels somewhat different to the other two adaptations in that it doesn't focus around an institution.

Cover Her Face - P. D. James Cover Her Face - P. D. James

In a 1966 book review, Anthony Boucher of The New York Times wrote "This is a literate and not unpromising first novel, but modeled firmly upon the detective story of 30 years ago at its dullest.But the arrival of Sally Jupp to help housekeeper Martha in the kitchen (a formiddable Jean Heywood) shakes up the whole place in ways they never imagined.

Cover Her Face: BBC Radio 4 Full-cast Dramatisation: A BBC Cover Her Face: BBC Radio 4 Full-cast Dramatisation: A BBC

It starred Roy Marsden as Adam Dalgliesh, John Vine as Inspector John Massingham (instead of Detective Sergeant Martin), Phyllis Calvert as Eleanor Maxie, Rupert Frazer as Stephen Maxie, Mel Martin as Deborah Riscoe, Julian Glover as Felix Hearne, and Kim Thomson as Sally Jupp. Straight from the off we follow Sally Jupp (Kim Thomson), a single mum with her baby son, get out of a taxi to go and visit her old work colleagues at the Book Club in the city. Chief Superintendent Adam Dalgliesh investigates the death of Alice Liddell who ran a home for unwed mothers. Rupert Frazer's Stephen Maxie, however, is so objectionable that you can't help but hope that someone punches him on the nose before the end of the mystery. It's this, and the feeling throughout she is in grave danger, that keeps you on her side, despite her manipulative character.

Eleanor Maxie who eventually confesses to the murder of Sally Jupp after Dalgliesh reveals everyone's movements on the night. Sally had blackmailed her uncle (who unbeknownst to her had spent her modest trust fund) into giving her 30 pounds. The Maxie household at the country house seem ordinary enough however, with Eleanor Maxie (Phyllis Calvert) looking after her ailing husband upstairs, while children Stephen and Deborah (Mel Martin) argue over whether to sell the house or not. Indeed, it has to be said that after Sally is indeed later found murdered that this mystery begins to lag somewhat. Maxie has managed to deceive his devoted servant Martha, pretending to take the tablets when he is simply concealing them for a suicide attempt.

Cover Her Face - Wikipedia Cover Her Face - Wikipedia

It also features a couple of topless scenes involving Marsden and Frazer that was likely meant to add a bit of phwoar factor in but is more likely to see women (and men) running screaming from the room at the sight of such skinny pasty bodies.He also becomes convinced that Sally isn't telling him everything she knows, but when he goes to question her at St Mary's Refuge for Single Mothers the manageress Alice Liddell (Freda Dowie) informs him that she is no longer living there. In what seems an astonishing stroke of luck she meets Dr Stephen Maxie (Rupert Frazer) on a train, who hears what happened to her and hires her to work at his family's country home.