Cosy season has just received another blessing: an Agatha Christie murder mystery Netflix series, Seven Dials, starring national treasure Helena Bonham Carter and rising star Mia McKenna-Bruce.
While the Queen of Crime's original novel of the same name featured a Lord (not Lady Caterham) as a key character, the Netflix adaptation brings a woman's touch to proceedings, making way for Helena to take on a key role in the story.
Set in the Roaring Twenties, we see Mia's Lady Eileen (aka Bundle) find herself in the middle of a murder mystery when someone very dear to her is found dead after a raucous party the night before and a prank gone wrong. But she soon starts to suspect that something more sinister is afoot, and sets out to solve the twisted secret behind a series of deaths that seem to involve a mysterious organisation, the Seven Dials. It's perfect sofa season fodder, three episodes of flapper girl dresses, period drama gorgeousness and, of course, whodunnit intrigue.
Mia has stormed the Hollywood scene in recent years with an amazing performance in Molly Manning-Walker’s zeitgeist-blasting How To Have Sex in 2023 – followed by a turn in Sister Wives, a compelling short film centred around both repressive polygamy and queer love, as two “wives” fall in forbidden love with each other.
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The actor talks filming sexual assault scenes and the importance of conversations for creating change.
She is also currently filming Everybody Wants To F**k Me, a comedy thriller about modern dating and is most excitingly set to star as Maureen Starkey, partner of Ringo Starr, in the upcoming Beatles biopics from director Sam Mendes, appearing alongside Saoirse Ronan as Linda McCartney, Harris Dickinson as John Lennon, Paul Mescal as Paul McCartney, Joseph Quinn as George Harrison and Barry Keoghan as her on-screen husband Ringo Starr.
Helena, of course, needs less introduction – with her legacy draped across decades of film and TV history, from Harry Potter to Fight Club and Sweeney Todd. That said, she is still making forays into unexpected and exciting territories. Since our interview, she has also been reported to be in talks to become a member of the season 4 cast of The White Lotus.
The on-screen mother-daughter duo sat down with Glamour to talk about bringing Agatha Christie's story to the screen in a “feminist” fashion, ageism and sexism in the entertainment industry, and Helena's advice for Mia as she enters the behemoth Beatles biopic franchise.
Glamour: So the creators of the TV series decided to change the gender of the key parental character from Lord to Lady, man to woman…
Mia: They said, "We've changed [from] Lord to Lady Caterom." And I was like, “Brilliant, that's genius because you don't see many mother-daughter relationships [on screen] as well.” Then they said, "She's being played by Helena Bonham Carter" – cue a very ecstatic Mia.
Helena: It sort of makes it all bang on. It made sense because we've been trying to be a bit feminist… With this one [Mia] being the lead and then me as the mum. And it is [set in] a patriarchal society.
Glamour: So it challenges the patriarchy?
Helena: Oh, big time. Oh, yeah.
Glamour: Mia, we see your character Bundle go through some pretty visceral grief early on. She even smashes up a desk and Helena, your character Lady Caterham says “Leave her to her grief”. How did you guys feel about really having that space to portray female anger and grief in this way, when oftentimes this has not been encouraged for women on screen?
Mia: It felt great smashing up the desk for sure. Yeah, I think there is something beautiful about seeing a mother and a daughter get a bit messy with it all as well, especially the weight of everything they're carrying.
Helena: Yes. And I think [Lady Caterham] is so grief-stricken. She knows the ins and everything's, having been through such grief. So she's really talking from huge experience, to let her express it.
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Glamour: What was it like to work with Martin Freeman after his murder mystery experience on Sherlock?
Mia: I mean, it was great for me. Martin and I just kind of took the mick out of each other all the way along. So we had a lot of fun with that. He's trying to crack on with his investigation. Bundle's trying to do her investigation. She just kind of tries to get involved. And it was a bit like that in real life.
Glamour: Mia, we first spoke in the run-up to the release of How To Have Sex – how does it feel reflecting back on that and what it did for education around consent?
Mia: I still get so many people who have only recently watched it and still say that it means a lot to them. So that feels really special. I'm just so grateful to it, getting to do that gave me a confidence and a trust and self-belief in myself to do things like this and figure out where I wanted to go, the stories that I wanted to tell and the fact that I wanted to do things with such strong female characters. I think I realised that that was really important to me from doing that film.
Glamour: Helena, you've been really vocal about the experiences of women in the entertainment industry, particularly in terms of ageism and sexism – what have you seen change, and what would you still like to see change?
Helena: It's a huge change since I was your age [to Mia]. It's only now that I realise that you'd walk on set and you'd have hair, makeup and costume were women, and continuity, and that was it… It was a very male environment.
Often, there would be male makeup people, as there should be, but you wouldn't really see women apart from the actors. And now with [Seven Dials], we had a female grip. She was amazing. And a lot of women on the camera crew.
Mia: It's a lot less male-dominated now.
Helena: Totally. And it's diverse across the board, which is great… You want to have good stories, and they're quite hard to come by for older people, whether you are female or male. But things are getting better, especially with the proliferation of telly, which means you get these stories which are character-led.
Glamour: What makes you both feel empowered?
Helena: A really good pair of shoes. These make me feel quite grounded and powerful because they've given me about four inches, but I still feel balanced. But on a pair of high heels, I wouldn't.
Mia: That's genius. That was another thing Helena taught me earlier on.
Helena: Shoes.
Mia: You said always have good shoes.
Helena: Be self-sufficient. Find your own shoes. And once you've got a good pair of period shoes, keep them. And snacks. Always have your own snacks. And basically, you're responsible for yourself. Don't expect somebody else to get you the coffee that you need for this take. You've got to bring it yourself.
Glamour: What do you hope audiences take from watching Seven Dials?
Helena: I hope it makes them feel ... There's a Christie cosiness, but then there's real Christie danger. So it's those two. And hopefully people will go watch it and have that whodunnit, can't predict it [feel].
Mia: I hope it invites a new audience into Christie as well, because I think for me, I was always someone who felt a bit intimidated by Agatha Christie… I didn't do it at school or anything. I didn't really know how to approach a book.
Helena: But you don't have to do it. It's not academic.
Mia: No, but it felt the language felt almost too advanced for me.
Helena: Well, this is very accessible.
Mia: Yeah. But then in doing this, it's kind of opened it up for me, so I hope it can do that for other people for sure.
Glamour: Helena, what advice would you give to Mia as she is set to star in the big upcoming Beatles biopic movie series after your time in similarly massive film franchises? Particularly in terms of holding herself as a woman in an industry, which is arguably sometimes made difficult…
Helena: Who plays the girlfriend?
Mia: I do, I play Ringo Starr's girlfriend [Maureen Starkey].
Helena: You've got to speak up for her.
Mia: That's beautiful.
Helena: But that's up to the script.
Mia: Is it? Yeah, it's beautiful. Okay. It's good. She's a good character.
Helena: Being the wife, that's a great story. But make sure your moments are there.
Mia: That gave me goosebumps.
This interview was edited and condensed for clarity.
Agatha Christie’s Seven Dials arrives on Netflix on 15 January.
From Helena Bonham Carter to How To Have Sex star Mia McKenna-Bruce.
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