Introducing the unflappable Miss Fisher

Introducing the unflappable Miss Fisher

In February I did a blog post centred around The Mrs Bradley Mysteries, the short-lived 1999 Twenties-set murder-mystery series starring Dame Diana Rigg, which was being shown again on B.B.C. Four and which inspired me to purchase the DVD box set.

At the time I remarked on how it was a shame the series was not a great success when first broadcast and that there were no more than 5 episodes, with nothing else quite like it coming along since.  Well now there is a new murder-mystery drama that to these eyes has a lot [of good] in common - Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries.  The catch?  It's only broadcast in Australia!

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A fairly recent creation (1989), Phryne Fisher looks to be very much the home-grown Australian heroine but in many respects is much like Ariadne Bradley - perhaps even a younger version of her.  The protagonist in seventeen books (so far), which have already been picked up and turned into a 13-episode series by Australian broadcaster ABC1, she is somewhat reminiscent of both Mrs Bradley and also the earlier Tuppence Beresford from the 1980s series Agatha Christie's Partners in Crime (Tommy & Tuppence).

Unlike both those two series, however, Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries appears to have been a great success in its native country.  It is also rather interesting in that it is set in 1920s Australia, and this seems to have attracted viewers keen to connect with this period of their nation's history.  (If any Australian readers would care to pass comment, I'd be interested to know if I've called it right, and what you think of the series).  I don't know about you, but I'd be interested in the setting too - we see and read so much about Twenties America, Twenties Britain, even Twenties Europe yet comparatively little about Twenties Australia.  A programme set in that time period in Australia would go some way towards filling that void, I feel sure.

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Neighbours and Home and Away are both great export successes for Australian television and I from what little I've seen I see no reason why Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries shouldn't be as well.  We all know vintage and retro is riding the crest of a worldwide wave at the moment and I'm sure that any cultural references that might exist in the programme wouldn't detract from it or spoil our enjoyment of it.  Come on, ABC Television - send Miss Fisher abroad, it looks positively topping!

Music, Murder and The Mrs Bradley Mysteries

All images courtesy of Fanpop

Like a few of my fellow vintage bloggers I have been thoroughly enjoying the recent re-runs of the [sadly short-lived] B.B.C. series from the late '90s, The Mrs Bradley Mysteries starring Dame Diana Rigg, a few episodes of which have found their way on to B.B.C. Four (Wednesdays, 9p.m.).

Dame Diana plays society divorcée Adela Bradley, an amateur criminologist (with a penchant for the psychological) who is ably assisted by her loyal chauffeur George Moody (Neil Dudgeon).  Both roles are expertly essayed, and supporting cast members include Peter Davison, David Tennant and Meera Syal.  It's a wonderful feast for fans of the 1920s with period cars, fashions, music and scenery galore.  Author Gladys Mitchell's stories have been very well adapted for the screen.

It's only a pity, then, that the series was so under-appreciated - to the extent that it never made it past one series.  The 90-minute pilot and four hour-long episodes are all that exist of this excellent programme.

At the time it was first aired I was not as fully immersed in vintage as I am now, so was not able to appreciate it properly, but with these latest showings I have been able to really enjoy this series.  So much so, in fact, that I've bought the 2-disc DVD set.  Now I can enjoy the adventures of Mrs Bradley to my heart's content!  The B.B.C. broadcasts are available on iPlayer, of course, and the pilot Speedy Death plus the second episode Death at the Opera (which was the one starring David Tennant) are both available on YouTube.



At the same time as my rediscovery of The Mrs Bradley Mysteries I also felt the desire to introduce a little more of 1920s/'30s British bandleader Ambrose & His Orchestra into my daily soundtrack (his version of Happy Days Are Here Again remains one of my top 10 songs) so I set about looking for CDs.  In no short order two (one a double-disc set) have made it into my music collection.



They were both mine - new, from a well-known South American-inspired online trading emporium - for a little less than £5.  The Mrs Bradley DVDs were the same.  So for less than a tenner I have a new pile of Twenties goodness to enjoy.  What always gets me about this sort of thing - and perhaps you've noticed this as well - is that most media related to vintage, as much as it is available at all, is either heinously expensive/ completely unavailable (memories of the aforementioned retailer having books/CDs/DVDs for sale "new and used" starting at ridiculous figures like £50 spring to mind) or dirt cheap like my latest purchases.  It has often been a source of puzzlement to me that such items, which can appear so similar in genre, are only ever rarer than hens' teeth or practically being given away (more of the latter, I say!).  And, of course, it goes without saying that finding such items in your local high street shops is a once-in-a-blue-moon experience, such as when I found a copy of the 1935 version of The 39 Steps in the DVD section of Woolworths for £4.93 (?!) or an Elsie Carlilse CD in my local Sainsburys for 99p.

Oh well, perhaps another mystery for Mrs Bradley to solve, eh?