In Conversation With Michael Maloney As He Steps Into Poirot's Shoes

Michael Maloney says he has only one ‘claim to fame’ regarding York – the fact that he’s never appeared on stage in the city in a career spanning 40-plus years.

He could have made his professional stage debut in the city but chose not to. His first job offer after drama school was a year’s contract with the rep company at York Theatre Royal. But he turned it down in favour of a leading role in the BBC TV series Telford’s Change with Peter Barkworth and Hannah Gordon.

This proved a wise move. That series became essential viewing and was followed by his London West End debut – again with Barkworth and Gordon – in Can You Hear Me at the Back although before that his first theatre job was playing the back end of pantomime cow to get his Equity card.

Maloney finally treads the boards in York on March 25 when he boards the Orient Express at the Grand Opera House. The journey won’t be entirely without drama. This is, after all, an Agatha Christie rail excursion and there is - you’ve guessed it – a Murder on the Orient Express.

Fear not, Maloney, in the guise of Belgian detective Hercule Poirot, is a passenger with the requisite ‘little grey cells’ to work out whodunnit. The offer to play Poirot on stage came out of the blue. “It was so unexpected that I was just completely flattered. The first thing I thought was, ‘This is a bit of a challenge’. But I went in to see the producers with a completely open mind and they accepted me with open arms,” he recalls.

“The producers knew of me and my theatre abilities, what I could and couldn’t do, as they produced Kenneth Branagh’s theatre productions and I’d worked with him and his Renaissance theatre company on five different projects.”

Coincidentally Branagh is the latest big screen Poirot, having played the Belgian detective in three recent movies. “I didn’t ask him for any tips about playing Poirot but he was so happy for me, so generous about it and so incredibly supportive. I was really thrilled he came to the show a few weeks ago,” says Maloney.

Maloney was keenly aware that by playing Poirot he was following in the footsteps of what he calls ‘significant actors’ including Branagh and David Suchet, who very much made the part his own in the long-running ITV series. The latter sent the new Poirot a ‘very heart-warming message” via Maloney’s actress daughter Martha who was making a short film with Suchet.

Is Maloney’s Poirot different to previous incarnations? “First of all there are elements of everybody’s performance that I’ve seen as Poirot. I took them with me without a doubt,” he explains.

“If you go in direct opposition to what’s gone before you will create conflict with the audience’s expectations. The thing is that this performance is on stage not on camera. On film you have the magnificent luxury of the close-up. On stage you act through the language, your body, demeanour - and it’s bigger.”

When we speak he’s on week 20 of the six-month tour on the Orient Express. The experience has refreshed his acting ambitions. “This opportunity is a complete revival of my desire to work in the theatre and entertainment again,” he says.

“It’s the concept of going in to work every day. For some years I was a part-time carer for my mum, then my dad and at 13 my daughter Martha came to live with me. I was working about 30 days a year which got me through along with my savings. By the time we got to the end of the cycle I was on ground zero.”

Daughter Martha graduated from Bristol Theatre School last year is now making her own film. But Maloney fears for the next generation of would-be actors. Growing up everyone told him ‘don’t do it’ when he said he wanted to act while careers teachers emphasised what a difficult profession it was with a large percentage of actors out of work most of the time.

“I had no great ambition when I started, just to get as much great work as possible. After I got a second job, I thought ‘maybe I can get a third job’. You need to keep the momentum going or you don’t get the parts,” he says.

“This is a significant problem all young actors are having these days. There is no system like York Theatre Royal rep. There’s not a town or city in this country that has a permanent rep company. That’s very serious for the whole tradition of acting excellence in this country.”

He recalls how as a young actor he, like many other young actors, would write to theatres around the country seeking work. For the hundreds of letters sent, you’d be lucky to get replies from five per cent of them.
“You went to work at a theatre and stayed there a year which gave you enormous confidence of going into work every day,” he says.

“Today people live on social media instead of going places and meeting each other. They’re working in isolation and communicating with each other in groups. It makes for a very separated community and that’s not a good thing at all.”

“If I had to be a beginner as an actor today I think I’d suffer greatly because they have to work so hard to market themselves.”

His own CV is testament to a career that’s taken in a variety of roles on stage, film and theatre including two Hamlets (one in Japan), King Lear, Romeo and other roles with the Royal Shakespeare Company as well as a catalogue of television roles.

He doesn’t have any regrets apart from having to turn down the chance to play the title role in Shakespeare’s Henry V in Chicago because of family illness. He also asked for his name to be removed from the list of actors being considered for the film Withnail and I. He was “essentially scared” of the role but “other things came along to replace it so it’s okay”.

He may not be saying goodbye to Hercule Poirot just yet. Murder on the Orient Express May have a life after the current tour while a UK tour of a new production of another Agatha Christie thriller Death on the Nile by the same team has already been confirmed.

“There have been talks but I’ll have to hang fire and see how it comes up. I would have to make a choice if it were given to me,” he says, not giving anything away.

Murder on the Orient Express: York Grand Opera House, 25-29 March.