Bob Barrett – known to millions for his role as Dr Sacha Levy in the BBC1 medical drama Holby City – is a doctor again but in very different circumstances as the Agatha Christie classic And Then There Were None goes on tour.
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00:00 Good afternoon, my name is Phil here at
00:05 Group Arts, editor for Sussex Newspapers.
00:07 Great pleasure to speak to Bob Barrett about a subject
00:09 very dear to my heart in particular,
00:11 Angathoprosyne.
00:13 And Bob, you are on the road with
00:15 'And Then There Were None', which is one of the
00:17 greatest mysteries, isn't it?
00:19 It's such a brilliant story.
00:21 Without giving away too much, and of course you
00:23 wouldn't, just set the scene then.
00:25 What is happening?
00:27 The scene is that ten people have been
00:29 taken to a place called Soldier Island
00:31 individually, without knowing
00:33 who they're going to be with,
00:35 or they've been given a reason
00:37 why they're there,
00:39 but they don't know that
00:41 necessarily any other people
00:43 are there. Some do, some don't.
00:45 And
00:47 I think they know they're coming for a dinner party,
00:49 and then,
00:51 once they're there, the play ensues.
00:53 And the real motive as to why
00:55 they're there
00:57 in Soldier Island is
00:59 revealed to them quite
01:01 quickly, once they've arrived.
01:03 And we're giving nothing away if we
01:05 say the fact is these are
01:07 culpable, guilty,
01:09 flawed people. That's what they have
01:11 in common, isn't it?
01:13 They're guilty people. They all have a secret
01:15 which they've hidden, and that
01:17 is revealed to them
01:19 once they arrive.
01:21 Yeah, and you were saying so interestingly
01:23 that one of the great things, one of the
01:25 great things of this play is that you
01:27 very deliberately are leaving the
01:29 audience rudderless. What do you
01:31 mean by that? Yeah. I think
01:33 because there isn't a
01:35 character in the
01:37 play that you can get
01:39 squarely behind. There's no
01:41 Tuaro, there is
01:43 no Marple
01:45 who you know will solve the crime.
01:47 So therefore,
01:49 all the characters have a
01:51 dark past, and no one is
01:53 uniquely sympathetic in the play,
01:55 which means that you
01:57 get to choose, A) who
01:59 you think might have done it.
02:01 There's a huge amount in the interval of people
02:03 discussing, going, "Who do you think did it? Who do you think did it?
02:05 I think it's this. I think it's that person."
02:07 Lots of shocks, lots of surprises,
02:09 but you are left
02:11 really having
02:13 to work the play out
02:15 for yourself as it's being revealed.
02:17 And then the pneumo is so
02:19 shocking and so extraordinary
02:21 that I
02:23 guess because you're
02:25 involved in the play in a different way, you're not
02:27 just sitting back and going, "Well, that person will
02:29 solve the crime." You know
02:31 that you're more front foot as an audience
02:33 than sitting back.
02:35 Isn't it interesting, over the years, various theatres
02:37 have been a bit sniffy about Agatha Christie.
02:39 Fairly, haven't they?
02:41 Because the point is, these are
02:43 properly rounded, interesting
02:45 characters. A genuine
02:47 plausible dilemma, aren't they?
02:49 That's exactly it. And I think
02:51 she used to get a lot of sick, and I think
02:53 I don't understand why, because I think these books
02:55 are perfectly formed,
02:57 beautifully formed. The characters are
02:59 extraordinary. She's got a great
03:01 one of the great gifts for characters,
03:03 I think, in the language. And I think
03:05 she
03:07 weirdly,
03:11 and I wonder what,
03:13 this is a fascinating debate,
03:15 she's more popular now than ever.
03:17 She gets more films, there's more
03:19 films done about her, there's more TV
03:21 programmes done about her, people are now fascinated
03:23 in her life. The Lucy Worsley
03:25 documentaries about her are hugely popular.
03:27 I think there's more,
03:29 now,
03:31 I think, gone are the days where
03:33 she's looked down on and people are snooty
03:35 about her. Now, I think she's seen
03:37 to be the writer that she
03:39 is. And the books are
03:41 incredibly popular.
03:43 I think a lot, sometimes, we're sceptical.
03:45 I mean, I know I'm,
03:47 I read books all the time and I read very obscure
03:49 books and I love my obscure books, but
03:51 I think she's, people, when
03:53 writers are very, very popular, people
03:55 can be sceptical about them. But for some
03:57 reason, I think that's changing.
03:59 - With this one, you see the reasons for the
04:01 popularity, then? - Absolutely,
04:03 because, you know, we're playing out to sold
04:05 houses, sold out houses all around the country.
04:07 People love,
04:09 love, love, love this book,
04:11 this play and this show. - And you're
04:13 on the way to
04:15 Brighton, Guildford and Southampton in the
04:17 next few months. - Yes, we are. We are.
04:19 - I'm looking forward very, very much indeed to seeing
04:21 the show. Really, really
04:23 lovely to speak to you. Thank you. - Lovely to
04:25 speak to you too. Thank you very much. Thank you.