Murder by Death - Trivia, Questions and Fun Facts

[discussimdb]

Fan of Murder by Death or just want to share your movie knowledge? This topic is dedicated to all trivia and questions related to Murder by Death

[brent]

Theatrical movie debut of James Cromwell (Marcel), who had previously starred only in a few television series. Cromwell went on to become an extremely prolific thespian, with more than one hundred eighty acting credits.

[duane]

Eileen Brennan starred in another "old Dark House" mystery genre comedy, Clue (1985), an adaptation of the board game Clue, in which she played Mrs. Peacock.

[norma]

In the television edit of this movie, which contains footage not released theatrically nor on home video, Keith McConnell and Richard Peel appeared at the end as "Sherlock Holmes" and "Doctor Watson", respectively.

[morris]

Although the atmosphere is meant to evoke the 1930s and early 1940s, certain details in the story (contemporary-branded groceries in the kitchen, Twain's age and the price of paperback novels, for two) indicate that the setting is in the 1970s.

[christina]

First feature film for director Robert Moore.

[norma]

Phil Silvers had a small role, but his scenes were deleted in the final release print.

[sylvia]

The setting moves from a dark and rutted country road to an isolated, gloomy, fog-shrouded English-style manor house. Construction on the mansion began in August 1975. While an elaborate and complex edifice, the structure was completed in record time. Although the script described the house as Victorian, production designer Stephen B. Grimes took some artistic liberties. In his mind, Grimes pictured the kind of American estates which millionaires, such as the Hearsts or Morgans, used to bring over, stone-by-stone, from Europe.

[aaron]

Peter Sellers also played Jessica Marbles' taxi driver, but the scene was deleted.

[claude]

Between takes on the set, Dame Maggie Smith and James Coco played a lot of scrabble together. Estelle Winwood, who had played bridge since she was eighteen, played either gin rummy or solitaire, and Truman Capote did some work on his latest book, "Answered Prayers". Writer Neil Simon, between interviews and takes on the set, was often in his trailer working on a new play and a new screenplay. David Niven was ecstatically watching his book, "Bring On The Empty Horses", climb to the top of the best-seller charts all over the U.S. Elsa Lanchester was busy working with Charles Higham on the biography of her late husband Charles Laughton, which publishing house Doubleday was scheduled to publish in May 1976. Peter Sellers, an accomplished photographer, shot photos of the cast while they were assembled in the dining room set. Sellers gave each fellow player 11 x 14 color prints of his work at the close of production. When Eileen Brennan had a long lunch break, she would dash home to spend it with her two pre-school sons. Sir Alec Guinness spent some of his days off on the movie strolling around Beverly Hills, with much of the remainder of his free time, he used writing a show based on the work of Jonathan Swift. Peter Falk, between scenes, paced back and forth in front of his trailer so often, that Producer Ray Stark gifted him with a treadmill. Falk was also involved in the editing and post-production of a movie for television in which he had recently starred, "Phoenix Loves Griffin", which was later retitled as Griffin and Phoenix (1976).

[albert]

Peter Sellers reportedly played several practical jokes on cast and crew during filming, including once calling Neil Simon up and imitating co-star Sir Alec Guinness and demanding a re-write of a key scene in the middle of the night. Neither Guinness nor Simon were amused.

[caroline]

(At around fifty-nine minutes) When each companion reports hearing gunshots to his or her respective sleuth, the visual of Miss Skeffington saying "Gunshots, Sam!" was removed from the final print of the movie; only the audio is heard. Both the audio and video of the sequence were included in the trailer for the movie, however (as seen on the DVD release).

[elmer]

Monsieur Perrier tells Irene/Rita Twain (at that point being played by Alec Guinness) that "as a man you are barely passable, but as a woman, you are a dog". In Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949), Guinness plays eight different roles, including one exceedingly unattractive woman.

[sylvia]

Alec Guinness and Peter Sellers starred in the 1955 film The Ladykillers (1955).

[jessie]

The character name "Lionel Twain" is wordplay referring to the Lionel company, which made model trains.