50 Fun Facts About Murder on the Orient Express

The 1932 kidnapping of which famous aviator's baby son inspired the Armstrong case in Murder on the Orient Express?

Charles Lindbergh's 20-month-old son was taken from his crib and found dead even though a ransom was paid. Christie reworked the case two years later as the fate of little Daisy Armstrong.

In Murder on the Orient Express, the killers who each stab Ratchett in turn see themselves as which kind of body?

A jury is how the twelve avengers see themselves, since their victim had escaped the courts. Each strikes once in the dark, so nobody can know whose blow was the fatal one.

Which actor and director cast himself as Hercule Poirot in the 2017 film of Murder on the Orient Express?

Kenneth Branagh directed himself as Poirot and came back for two sequels. He said he enjoyed finding the obsessive-compulsive in the detective rather than the dandy.

Agatha Christie liked the 1974 film of Murder on the Orient Express but was let down by which feature of its Poirot?

His moustache fell far short of the magnificent one she had written for her detective. Even so, it was one of only two screen versions of her books that she said she liked.

Which actress won an Oscar for 1974's Murder on the Orient Express in a small role as a missionary?

Ingrid Bergman was offered the grander part of Princess Dragomiroff but insisted on playing Greta Ohlsson. Her one big scene was filmed as a single take of almost five minutes.

The firm behind the real Orient Express was founded by a banker's son from which country, Hercule Poirot's homeland?

Belgium was home to Georges Nagelmackers, who set up the Wagons-Lits sleeping-car company in 1872 after admiring Pullman night trains on a trip to America.

The last scene of the 2017 film Murder on the Orient Express sets up a sequel based on which Christie novel?

Death on the Nile is teased when a messenger hands Poirot a note asking for his help as he steps off the train. The sequel reached cinemas in 2022.

Which star plays Ratchett, the shady American stabbed in his berth, in the 2017 film Murder on the Orient Express?

Johnny Depp's character is found stabbed a dozen times, and Poirot soon unmasks him as a notorious gangster travelling under a false name.

Which James Bond actor did the makers of 1974's Murder on the Orient Express approach first, to play Colonel Arbuthnot?

Sean Connery was asked first on the theory that once the biggest star says yes, the rest will follow. He later admitted that he had been flattered into it.

Moved by the Armstrong tragedy, what does Hercule Poirot finally do about the killers in Murder on the Orient Express?

Poirot lets them go free, putting forward another theory in which a lone intruder slipped off the train. The victim's crime had cost at least five lives, and he had escaped justice in America.

In Murder on the Orient Express, a snowdrift strands the train between Vinkovci and Brod in which country?

Yugoslavia is where the train sticks fast, on a stretch of line that now lies in northeastern Croatia. With deep snow all around, the killer cannot have left the coach.

In Murder on the Orient Express, the victim calling himself Ratchett is really a fugitive gangster with which surname?

Cassetti had kidnapped and killed three-year-old Daisy Armstrong, then escaped justice by fleeing the country. Poirot works out the alias from a charred piece of paper naming the child.

In Murder on the Orient Express, the talkative American Mrs Hubbard turns out to be which relation of Daisy Armstrong?

Grandmother to Daisy, she is really the celebrated stage star Linda Arden. At the end she offers to take the blame as the mastermind of the revenge.

In Christie's novel Murder on the Orient Express, which of the thirteen suspects alone is innocent of the stabbing?

Countess Andrenyi, sister of Daisy's mother, never strikes a blow. Her husband takes her place as the twelfth killer and smudges her luggage label to keep her above suspicion.

In Murder on the Orient Express, a handkerchief marked H is Natalia Dragomiroff's because H is N in which alphabet?

Cyrillic writes the sound N with a letter that looks like a Latin H, so the monogram stands for Natalia. The Russian princess admits that the handkerchief is hers.

In Murder on the Orient Express, Hercule Poirot glimpses a woman in the corridor wearing a kimono of which colour?

Scarlet is the colour several passengers recall, yet nobody admits to owning the garment. It finally turns up inside Poirot's own luggage.

In the novel Murder on the Orient Express, the dagger that killed Ratchett turns up in which item of Mrs Hubbard's?

Her sponge bag is where Mrs Hubbard herself discovers the weapon. It is one of a string of planted clues meant to send Poirot hunting for an outsider.

Which director of the Wagons-Lits company, a friend of Hercule Poirot, finds him a berth on the full Orient Express?

Monsieur Bouc gets his friend a bed and later breaks the news of the murder. Having slept in a locked second coach, he is one of only two passengers above suspicion.

Early in Murder on the Orient Express, the wealthy American Ratchett offers Hercule Poirot a job doing what?

Guarding his life is the job, because Ratchett has been receiving threats. Poirot turns him down, and soon afterwards the man is stabbed in the compartment next to his.

In Murder on the Orient Express, Englishwoman Mary Debenham is returning from Baghdad, where she has worked as what?

A governess in Baghdad, she had once taught in the Armstrong household. Poirot overhears her talking with Colonel Arbuthnot before he even boards the train.

Murder on the Orient Express became Murder in the Calais Coach in America to avoid a clash with whose novel?

Graham Greene's Stamboul Train had just been sold to American readers under the title Orient Express. It was his first real success, set on a rail journey from Ostend to Istanbul.

The Baron Hotel, where Agatha Christie reputedly began Murder on the Orient Express in room 203, is in which city?

Aleppo's Baron Hotel also put up Lawrence of Arabia, and a copy of his unpaid bar bill is kept on display there. The Syrian landmark was damaged in the civil war but survived.

Which Istanbul landmark, opened in 1895 for Orient Express passengers, keeps a room as a memorial to Agatha Christie?

Pera Palace Hotel claims she wrote the novel there, though her autobiography never says so. It was once run by a hotel arm of the same company that operated the train.

Agatha Christie's Orient Express was held up by floods in 1931 as she travelled home from her husband's work as what?

An archaeologist, Max Mallowan was digging at Nineveh in Iraq. In a letter to him she described fellow passengers who went on to inspire characters in the novel.

Before it was a book, Murder on the Orient Express ran in six parts in 1933 in which American magazine?

Saturday Evening Post readers met the story in autumn 1933, months before any book. The British magazine serial came after the book and cut about a quarter of the text.

A blizzard that trapped the real Orient Express for days in 1929, inspiring Christie, struck in which country?

Turkey saw the real train snowed in near Çerkezköy in February 1929. Christie had made her own first trip on the service only a few months earlier.

Which American crime writer attacked the solution of Murder on the Orient Express in his essay The Simple Art of Murder?

Raymond Chandler wanted detective fiction to mirror real crime, and this plot enraged him. The critic Robert Barnard still judged the book the best of the railway stories.

Hildegarde Schmidt, maid to Princess Dragomiroff in Murder on the Orient Express, once served the Armstrongs as what?

Their cook was her old role in the Armstrong household. Poirot also finds a railway uniform, part of the planted trail, hidden in her luggage.

In Murder on the Orient Express, the father of the wrongly accused nursemaid Susanne has which job aboard the train?

Conductor Pierre Michel lost his daughter when she killed herself after being falsely accused of helping the kidnapper. He joins the plot and supplies the spare uniform.

Which director made 1974's Murder on the Orient Express between his crime dramas Serpico and Dog Day Afternoon?

Sidney Lumet often returned to the theme of guilt, and in this story every suspect is guilty. He worked with his Poirot again 33 years later on Before the Devil Knows You're Dead.

Which star of 1974's Murder on the Orient Express is the only actor Oscar-nominated for playing Hercule Poirot?

Albert Finney was so heavily disguised that he complained the part typecast him for years. People assumed he really was a 300-pound man with a French accent.

Which Hollywood star plays the loud American widow Mrs Hubbard in the 1974 film Murder on the Orient Express?

Lauren Bacall's loud, foolish widow is itself a performance, since the character is secretly a famous stage star and the organiser of the revenge.

Which American actor plays Hector McQueen, the victim's young secretary, in the 1974 film Murder on the Orient Express?

Anthony Perkins, best known as Norman Bates in Psycho, plays the son of the district attorney from the kidnapping case. His character drugs the victim before the others strike.

Which Shakespearean actor plays Beddoes, the dead man's valet, in the 1974 film Murder on the Orient Express?

John Gielgud's manservant is called Masterman in the book, and the film renamed him. Seven years later he won an Oscar as another butler, in the comedy Arthur.

The snowbound scenes of 1974's Murder on the Orient Express were shot on a disused French railway in which mountains?

The Jura obliged with heavy snow the night before the shoot. That made the trucked-in backup snow unnecessary, which was lucky, because the trucks had themselves got stuck.

Which father-in-law of producer John Brabourne helped persuade Christie to allow 1974's Murder on the Orient Express?

Lord Mountbatten was called in because Christie, unhappy with 1960s films of her books, had refused to sell any more rights. She gave this one her rather grudging approval.

In Murder on the Orient Express, Hercule Poirot is travelling home from the Middle East to which city?

London is where he settled after coming to England as a refugee. The interrupted journey turns into the most famous case of his career.

The real Orient Express first set out in 1883 from which city, long its western terminus?

Paris was the starting point, and that first train ran only as far as Vienna. Direct trains to Constantinople, today's Istanbul, did not begin until 1889.

In the 2017 film Murder on the Orient Express, what derails the engine in place of the novel's simple snowdrift?

An avalanche knocks the locomotive off the rails, stranding everyone until a crew can lift it back. The final unmasking is staged outside the train rather than in the dining car.

Which star plays Caroline Hubbard in the 2017 film Murder on the Orient Express and sings Never Forget over its ending?

Michelle Pfeiffer recorded the original song during post-production, while the director watched over a video call from thousands of miles away.

Which Dame plays Princess Dragomiroff, with Olivia Colman as her maid, in the 2017 film Murder on the Orient Express?

Judi Dench's princess is an old friend of the plot's organiser. She later worked for the same director again on his film Belfast.

Which Spanish star plays Pilar Estravados, who replaces Greta Ohlsson in the 2017 film Murder on the Orient Express?

Penélope Cruz's missionary borrows her name from an unrelated character in another Christie novel, Hercule Poirot's Christmas.

Which Hamilton star plays Dr Arbuthnot, a blend of two book characters, in 2017's Murder on the Orient Express?

Leslie Odom Jr.'s doctor combines Colonel Arbuthnot with the Greek physician Constantine, and he is rewritten as a former army sniper.

The 2017 film Murder on the Orient Express used some of the same 65 mm cameras as which Christopher Nolan film?

Dunkirk came out the same year, and the Poirot film's director had acted in it shortly before his own shoot. They were the only two 2017 releases shot on 65 mm film.

The 2017 film Murder on the Orient Express opens with Hercule Poirot solving a theft at a church in which city?

Jerusalem's Church of the Holy Sepulchre is the scene of the theft. Christie's novel, by contrast, spends its opening chapters mainly in Istanbul.

Which actor voiced Hercule Poirot in a 2006 computer game of Murder on the Orient Express?

David Suchet, ITV's Poirot from 1989 to 2013, lent his voice even though the game sidelines the detective, who is laid up in his compartment while a new character, Antoinette Marceau, does the legwork.

Which actress played Mary Debenham opposite Toby Jones's Ratchett in ITV's 2010 Murder on the Orient Express?

Jessica Chastain joined a starry guest cast for the feature-length episode, with Barbara Hershey as Mrs Hubbard and David Morrissey as Colonel Arbuthnot.

A street on which Mediterranean island stood in for Istanbul in ITV's 2010 Murder on the Orient Express?

Malta supplied the street, while the train's interior was rebuilt at Pinewood Studios. Other scenes were shot on the Nene Valley Railway in England.

A 2015 two-night TV version moved Murder on the Orient Express to a 1933 train in which country?

Japan's Fuji Television renamed the detective Suguro Takeru and put him on a train bound for Tokyo. The second of its two nights told an original story.

Which actor played a younger, modern-day Hercule Poirot in the 2001 CBS television film of Murder on the Orient Express?

Alfred Molina's version moved the story to the present day, dropped four of the suspects and gave Poirot a romance with Vera Rossakoff.