Product Details

• Actors: James Warwick, Francesca Annis, Reece Dinsdale, Arthur Cox
• Directors: John A. Davis
• Format: Box set, Color, NTSC
• Language: English
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Number of tapes: 3
• Studio: Acorn Media
• VHS Release Date: May 29, 2001
• Run Time: 45 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars See all reviews (24 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B00005BGS5
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #2,085 in Video (See Bestsellers in Video)

  Popular in these categories: (What's this?)

  #3 in	Video > Mystery & Suspense > Mystery & Suspense Masters > Agatha Christie
  #3 in	Video > Boxed Sets > Mystery & Suspense
  #11 in	Video > Boxed Sets > Television

• This is item 1 in The Tommy & Tuppence Series.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com
Tommy and Tuppence Beresford show up rarely in Agatha Christie's books, but when they do, one thing's for certain: both they and the readers will have a good time. The same is true, for the most part, in this set introducing the adventure-seeking couple who take over a London detective agency. Oddly, Tommy and Tuppence made their television debut before Christie's better-known crime solvers, Hercule Poirot and Jane Marple. The video quality of the second two tapes (whose four episodes take place chronologically after the first tape, but were produced earlier) betrays a low budget, and the acting occasionally verges on farce--especially when it comes to Tuppence's obsession with hats. But then, the couple were always a lighthearted counterpoint to the more serious sleuthing of Poirot and Miss Marple. The lovely Francesca Annis (seen more recently in Wives and Daughters) is disarming as Tuppence, masking her shrewd eye with dippy charm; she may get the bellboy's name wrong every time, but she can spot the criminal faster than her straight-man husband. As Tommy, James Warwick expertly melds dinner-party suavity with bumbling boy-next-door charm. The pair are at their best in the two-hour feature "The Secret Adversary," which comprises the first tape. This tale of kidnapping and political intrigue reunites the childhood friends, thus beginning their life as Partners in Crime. --Larisa Lomacky Moore

From the Back Cover
The merry and married detective team and PBS Mystery! series favorite. Before Nick and Nora Charles, before Jonathan and Jennifer Hart-Tommy and Tuppence Beresford, the crime-solving couple created in the 1920s by Agatha Christie, set the gold standard for mixing marriage and mystery. Elegantly attired in stunning period outfits, the fun-loving and flirtatious couple thrive on matching wits with criminals and with each other. This collection of episodes from the popular TV series chronicles their partnership from its beginnings in The Secret Adversary through their days as Partners in Crime and proprietors of Blunt's Detective Agency. Starring British TV veterans Francesca Annis and James Warwick.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Christie lite, May 1, 2002

By	E. A Solinas "ea_solinas" (MD USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 10 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

The Tommy and Tuppence mysteries are frothier and lighter than the Miss Marple or Hercule Poirot mysteries, but it's their lightness that makes them unique. They're well translated into film in this delightful threepack of the first five mysteries.

"Secret Adversary" is the only movie-length episode: Tommy and Tuppence, childhood friends, reunite post WW1 in financially tight circumstances. To drum up some money, they decide to become adventurers. But their lighthearted venture becomes deadly serious when they become enmeshed in an international situation involving a packet of secret documents, a mysterious girl named Jane Finn, an American millionaire and an elusive mastermind called only "Mr. Brown."

"Affair of the Pink Pearl" takes place a while after "Adversary," and is definitelty frothier. Tommy finds the cure for Tuppence's boredom: a detective agency, which they take over and inject new life into. Soon they are called on to retrieve a stolen pink pearl.

"The House of Lurking Death" is the destination of T&T, when an appealing young woman comes to tell them that someone in her house sent her poisoned chocolates. At first it seems to be a straightforward case -- but nothing is as simple as it seems.

"Finessing the King" is a little more gruesome than its predecessors. Tuppence drags Tommy to a costume ball and then to the restaurant "Ace of Spades," where they find a woman in a Queen of Hearts costume, stabbed on the floor. All evidence points to her lover, including her dying words, but of course nothing is so simple.

"The Clergyman's Daughter" comes to T&T with her problems: She thinks that her house may be haunted, by a poltergeist that is scaring off the paying guests she has there. The two travel to the house to find out exactly what the source of the mayhem is.

If you are expecting the same level of complexity as a Poirot/Wimsey/Marple mystery, you will be disappointed. With the exception of "Adversary," these mysteries were all based on short stories, and so they can't afford to be too complex. Nevertheless, they are enormous fun and some of them will definitely keep you guessing. There's plenty of wry comedy in this series, including Tuppence's turn as a weird spiritualist, her array of hats ("there are... NUANCES to them!"), and Albert's obsession with movies. (His dying gangster act is especially funny)

Francesca Annis is enormous fun as Tuppence, with a delightfully flaky charm that covers a brain as brilliant -- if not more brilliant -- than Tommy's. Her 1920s wardrobe is definitely eye-catching; she is also one of the few women I've ever seen who could make Audrey Hepburn look buxom. James Warwick is as noticeable in a quieter way as Tommy, with his cute smile, delightfully confused attitude, and attempts at Sherlock-Holmesian suavity and brilliance. Reece Dinsdale is flawless as Albert, the loyal sidekick with a weakness for Rudolph Valentino movies.

Some of the secondary actors are not quite as good; almost the entire cast of "House of Lurking Death" (except the fanatic) is about as expressive as pine boards with painfully civil dialogue, the girl playing Lois overdoes the breathy damsel act, and the Esther actress is hammy, period. The title character of "Clergyman's Daughter" also has an annoying habit of starting every sentence with a strained "oh." The other supporting actors are very good, though.

This is a delightful collection, and well worth watching.

27 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Easy-going high jinks with a winning couple, May 3, 2001

By	F. Behrens "Frank Behrens" (Keene, NH USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

Good old Acorn Media, who has given us all those Wimsey and Poirot mysteries on tapes and DVDs, is now offering up the first set of <Tommy & Tuppence: Partners in Crime>. Here we have three tapes holding five episodes starring Francesca Annis and James Warwick as the young couple who decides to purchase a defunct detective agency and solve their crimes in the styles of popular fictional sleuths.
The first tape is dedicated to "The Secret Adversary," a full-length tale of espionage rather than crime. This was Agatha Christie's second novel (the first being the first of the Poirots) and was written to get some quick cash for keeping up her family home. Here they meet again after some years apart, fall in love, and become a team for the fun of it. The décor, as with the other mystery series, is immaculately period (around World War I); and the big feature of this series are the fetching and far-fetched outfits Tuppence dons by way of "disguise."
While this team was to last up to 1973 when their last novel appeared, this series emphasizes their youthful adventures and stands in good contrast to the Poirot and Marple sets available from Acorn Media and from A&E. Annis' antics are a delight--although in one episode (not yet released) she is made to look ridiculous--but Warwick turns out to be somewhat of a dull potato by contrast. Perhaps that was intentional. Who can tell?
The stories are light and quite enjoyable. "The Affair of the Pink Pearl" is their first official case as professional detectives. "The House of Lurking Death" concerns death by poisoning and the question of who the intended victim really is. "Finessing the King" centers around a costumed ball with a solution that telegraphs itself far too early; while "The Clergyman's Daughter" borrows the idea of a word game from the Holmes tale "The Musgrave Ritual" and bears a strong resemblance to "Gaslight."
Again, if this series suffers at all, it is only in contrast to the more serious doings in the Wimsey, Poirot and Marple tales. However, on its own merits, "Partners in Crime" certainly deserves a top rating.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Loved the Series - Hated the Sound!, October 20, 2004

By	P. Aman (Chicago, IL USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Agatha Christie's Partners in Crime - Tommy & Tuppence, Set 1 (DVD)

This was an email I had to send to AcornMedia, the publishers of the DVD. I noticed that not one review mentioned the awful sound quality? I will followup this review when I check the DVDs at work..but...

Greetings!

I need to complain about the quality of your release of Tommy & Tuppence - Partners in Crime.

I recently rented Volume 1 from set 1 from Netflix, but noticed that on the episode of Affair of the pink Pearl, the volume for the program is very low - very unwatchable, but Secret Adversary for sound was good.

Thinking this might have been a Netflix issue, I recently bought this from an online vendor and noticed the exact same issue.

On Volume Two - the same issue House of Lurking Death -- volume was recorded at a low level, yet the other two episodes were perfect.

Whoever mastered these DVD's did an absolutely terrible job, and I will have no choice but to return my purchase, sadly, I loved this series when i was growing up watching it on PBS - but I cant watch it with the volume issue!

Are there any plans to reissue with the CORRECT audio volume?