If you’re looking for stars this weekend, don’t bother looking to the sky, just look at “Murder on the Orient Express.”
Agatha Christie’s classic murder mystery hits the big screen with an all-star A-list cast.
And I flew to London to chat with that cast and to get to the real story behind the biggest story in the movie — Hercule Poirot’s mustache.
Kenneth Branagh (as Hercule Poirot): “A passenger has died. He was murdered. The murderer is on the train with us now.”
But Whodunnit? That’s the question in “Murder on the Orient Express,” and leave it to one man to get to the bottom of it.
Kenneth Branagh (as Hercule Poirot): “My name is Hercule Poirot, and I am probably the greatest detective in the world.”
Kenneth Branagh was pulling triple duty in Orient Express as director, star and sporter of a mighty impressive mustache.
Kenneth Branagh: “We boldly went where no mustache had gone before.”
Chris Van Vliet: “Did you grow it for real?”
Kenneth Branagh: “I tried to grow it like I tried to grow the most ‘growy’ thing in my life, and it just was never happening.”
Johnny Depp (as Edward Ratchett): “Avenger of the innocent. Is that what they call you in the papers?”
Kenneth Branagh (as Hercule Poirot): “And you are innocent?”
When Johnny Depp’s character is murdered, everyone on the train becomes a suspect — and these aren’t just any passengers on this train. This is probably the most star-studded cast of any movie this year.
Chris Van Vliet: “How did this cast all come together?”
Kenneth Branagh: “‘Judi Dench’ was the magic word.”
Along with Judi Dench, we’ve got Penelope Cruz, Willem Dafoe, Josh Gad, Daisy Ridley and Michelle Pfeiffer just to name a few.
Michelle Pfeiffer: “It was very challenging getting everyone off camera. There were a lot of people to get in your eyeline.”
Michelle Pfeiffer (as Caroline Hubbard): “The real killer is right here. One of you people.”
You might remember this summer I rode on the actual Venice-Simplon Orient Express from Venice to Paris. Josh Gad was with us too, but I learned he was a little worried one of us might take the title of the movie literally.
Josh Gad: “What if one of the journalists, to get this crazy story, kills me in the middle of the night?”
Chris Van Vliet: “So one of us will kill you?”
Daisy Ridley: “Comes in with a fake knife to see how you’d react.”
Josh Gad: “I thought, like, Chris was going to walk in and kill me.”
Chris Van Vliet: “It would be a pretty good story.”
Josh Gad: “It would be a great story. I would do it if I were a journalist, so I was projecting that on you guys. So I sort of slept with one eye open.”
Chris Van Vliet: “So you didn’t sleep at all.”
Josh Gad: “No. I slept with one eye.”
“Murder on the Orient Express” rides into theaters Friday.
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