Miss Marple: At Bertram's Hotel
Miss Jane Marple is staying at an elegant hotel from her childhood compliments of her nephew Raymond. Also there is international adventurer Bess Sedgwick and Lady Selena Hazy (Joan Greenwood in her next to last performance). A doorman working at the hotel turns out to be from Bess' past, and when he is killed, she is the prime suspect. But what does his murder have to do with the disappearance of an elderly vicar staying at the hotel, and a string of robberies over the last few months? Miss Marple must find out before the murderer strikes again!!!
- 1987-1987
- 1 season
- PBS
- Suspense, Drama
Miss Jane Marple is staying at an elegant hotel from her childhood compliments of her nephew Raymond. Also there is international adventurer Bess Sedgwick and Lady Selena Hazy (Joan Greenwood in her next to last performance). A doorman working at the hotel turns out to be from Bess' past, and when he is killed, she is the prime suspect. But what does his murder have to do with the disappearance of an elderly vicar staying at the hotel, and a string of robberies over the last few months? Miss Marple must find out before the murderer strikes again!!!
Season 1 Episode Guide
2 Episodes 1987
Episode 1
Part One
Jane Marple is feeling nostalgia for the era of her youth. She has arranged to spend a few days at Bertram's Hotel, a classy hotel in London where she spend some of the happiest vacations of her childhood. The hotel has intentionally maintained a retro style that attracts old-fashioned clients. The most famous current guest at the hotel is Lady Bess Sedgwick, an aristocratic widow who has had a long career as an adventurer, mountain climber, and sportswoman. Marple soon gets the idea that Sedgwick is not vacationing, but scheming about something. Also staying at the hotel is Elvira Blake, Sedgwick's estranged daughter. Elvira has recently graduated from an Italian school and has just returned to England. The young heiress is asking questions to her legal guardian and surrogate father about her personal finances, who will inherit her fortune if she dies, and what will happen to her money if she marries. The elderly man is surprised by her questions, and is actually unable to answer several of them. Elvira has her first meeting with her mother since her infancy, but her mother refuses to have a relationship with her. Elvira has her own secret agenda, and arranges for a female friend to help her hide from her family for a short period. Sedgwick meets an old friend who is working at the hotel. After an initially pleasant conversation, Michael Gorman hints at knowing a secret from Sedgwick's past. She threatens to shoot him if he ever reveals it. Both Marple and Elvira are eavesdropping on their conversation. Marple learns that the police is investigating the hotel's possible connection to a series of bank robberies, and to some strange eyewitness reports involving doppelgangers of the hotel guests. Meanwhile, the elderly cleric Canon Pennyfather is having memory problems and fears that he is going senile. After missing a convention which he was supposed to attend, Pennyfather returns unexpectedly to the hotel. He tries to enter his hotel room, but he sees something strange and is then attacked.
Episode 2
Part Two
Elvira Blake has secret meetings with her lover Ladislaus Malinowski, who is also dating Elvira's mother, Lady Bess Sedgwick. During a date, Elvira notices that Ladislaus has a gun hidden in his sports car. Meanwhile, the 20-year-old Elvira asks one of the trustees of her father's will about the amount of money in her inheritance, and who will inherit the money if she dies. Jane Marple alerts the authorities about the disappearance of Canon Pennyfather, who has been missing for days. The elderly cleric is soon located in an area outside of London. He has a head injury, he is suffering from concussion, and he can not remember his whereabouts during the days of her disappearance. There are eyewitness reports of a doppelganger of Pennyfather taking part in a train robbery during these days. The hotel employee Michael "Mickey" Gorman is shot dead in the street during a foggy night. Elvira is found next to his body, claiming that someone tried to kill her. There are no other eyewitnesses. The murder weapon is Ladislaus' gun, though he claims that somebody stole it from his car. The investigation of Jane Marple and Chief Inspector Fred Davy uncovers that Mickey was Lady Sedgwick's original husband, with whom she eloped in her teen years. While the couple were estranged for 30 years, there was no legal divorce. Which means that all her subsequent weddings were bigamous. The investigation to the various doppelgangers associated with the hotel uncovers that the luxury hotel was only a front business for a crime syndicate, and that the syndicate used actors to impersonate several clients and to implicate them in its crimes. Lady Sedgwick is uncovered as the criminal mastermind at the head of the syndicate. While trying to escape by car, Sedgwick deliberately causes a fatal accident to avoid arrest. The issue of who killed Mickey remains open for a bit longer. Marple remembers that she hid her secret diary in her satchet when she was a young girl, so she searches through Elvira's satchet and uncovers Elvira's secret diary. The young woman had recorded that she personally killed Mickey to prevent him from ever revealing his relationship with her mother. She was afraid that she would be declared to be an illegitimate daughter of her parents (since their marriage was bigamous), that she would never inherit the fortune of either parent, and that her gold digger boyfriend would refuse to marry her if she was impoverished. Elvira is arrested for murder. Sedgwick was the actual owner of Bertram's hotel. Following her death, the hotel shuts down permanently. Marple leaves the hotel, while sadly contemplating the destruction of works of art.