Crack'd (EMI, directed by Guy Hamilton), based on Christie's 1962 novel. The film featured an all-star cast that included Elizabeth Taylor, Rock Hudson, Geraldine Chaplin, Tony Curtis, and Kim Novak. Edward Fox appeared as Inspector Craddock, who did Miss Marple's legwork. Lansbury's Marple was a crisp, intelligent woman who moved stiffly and spoke in clipped tones. Unlike most incarnations of Miss Marple, this one smoked cigarettes. Lansbury was later cast as Jessica Fletcher in Murder, She Wrote, a similar role. Television American TV was the setting for the first screen portrayal of Miss Marple with Gracie Fields, the British actress and singer, playing her in a 1956 episode of Goodyear TV Playhouse based on A Murder Is Announced, the 1950 Christie novel. In 1970, the character of Miss Marple was portrayed by Inge Langen in a West German television adaptation of The Murder at the Vicarage (Mord im Pfarrhaus). In 2015, CBS planned a "much younger" version of the character, a granddaughter who takes over a California bookstore. In 2018, Miss Marple was portrayed by Yunjin Kim in the South Korean television series Ms. Ma, Nemesis. Helen Hayes American stage and screen actress Helen Hayes portrayed Miss Marple in two American television films near the end of her decades-long acting career, both for CBS: A Caribbean Mystery (1983) and Murder with Mirrors (1985). Sue Grafton contributed to the screenplay of the former. Hayes's Marple was benign and chirpy. She had earlier appeared in a television film adaptation of the non-Marple Christie story Murder Is Easy, playing an elderly lady somewhat similar to Miss Marple. Joan Hickson From 1984 to 1992, the BBC adapted all of the original Miss Marple novels as a series titled Miss Marple. Joan Hickson played the lead role. In the 1940s, she had appeared on stage in an Agatha Christie play, Appointment with Death, which was seen by Christie who wrote in a note to her, "I hope one day you will play my dear Miss Marple". She portrayed a maid in the 1937 film, Love from a Stranger, which starred Ann Harding and Basil Rathbone, another Agatha Christie play adaptation. As well as portraying Miss Marple on television, Hickson narrated Miss Marple stories for audio books. In the "Binge!" article of Entertainment Weekly Issue #1343–1344 (26 December 2014 – 3 January 2015), the writers picked Hickson as "Best Marple" in the "Hercule Poirot & Miss