Crimes haute couture (Les Petits Meurtres d'Agatha Christie)

Crimes haute couture (High Fashion Crimes) is the 19th episode of season 2 of the French TV series Les Petits Meurtres d'Agatha Christie. It was produced by Escazal Films and France Télévisions, directed by Nicolas Picard-Dreyfuss and first aired on France 2 on 15 September 2017. It is an adaptation of the novel Third Girl.

Synopsis
Patricia Nollet, a young fashion designer, accuses herself of murder. She gets exonerated but keeps getting implicated in subsequent murders all of which take place at the Maison Paget fashion house. Laurence needs to find out what is going on at there. Alice helps out by getting engaged as a seamstress. Marlene, not to be left out, gets taken on as a model.

Plot Summary
(may contain spoilers - click on expand to read) Patricia Nollet, assistant designer of Édouard Paget of the Maison Paget fashion house, wakes up from a drunken stupor to find a body of a dead man next to her. He has been stabbed to death and there's blood all over Patricia's hands and coat. She staggers to the commissariat and confesses to killing him but she can't remember what happened. The man is identified as Paco Gomez, a delivery man recently fired from the Maison Paget. Glissant and Laurence are somewhat sceptical--the wounds of the man appear too severe for a woman with Patricia's strength to inflict. On the other hand, Patricia does have a history of violence. At the age of 15 she had stabbed her uncle and then had spent three years in a reformatory. Of Gomez, she can only remember that he was harassing her and wanted to rape her.

Meanwhile, Alice Avril insists on getting involved. She goes to Maison Paget. They think she has come in answer to an advert for a seamstress. Édouard Paget has been requiring his seamstresses to execute a proper triple cross stitch. Alice makes one which he deems perfect and she is hired!

Laurence goes to Maison Paget to pursue leads. Marlene begs to come along. Édouard Paget tells Laurence he has an alibi for Patricia. They had been hard at work through the night for an upcoming fashion show. At the same time, he notices Marlene and chats her up as a potential model. He invites her to a party the next day where he wants her to model one of his new dress designs. Meanwhile Patricia is released.

Shortly after the party that night, a unidentified woman is found dead, stabbed to death in the streets. A witness claims to have seen a brunette woman running away from the crime scene. Marlene recognises the dead woman as someone she had seen talking to Édouard Paget at the party but she doesn't know her name, neither does anyone else at the Maison Paget.

Meanwhile Marlene signs up to be a model for Édouard Paget. She lets it get to her head and her relationship with Alice is strained. But they do at least discover a blood soaked scarf and scissors. They belong to Patricia and so she is arrested again. She can't remember doing the killing this time either. But this time Tricard gives her an alibi. He was with her at a meeting of an Alcoholics Anonymous support group. She's a regular at the group and still an alcoholic.

With Patricia away, Louise Charpentier takes over running the workshop. She is too harsh in her ways and strikes Gigi, the head seamstress. Alice comes to her defence. Louise tries to fire her but Alice tells her there is the law and the workers have rights. Led by Alice, the seamstresses go on strike for better conditions. With only two days to the show, it's a disaster but Louise cynically suggests to Édouard that they should just agree to the terms and get the women back to work. Then after the show they can all be fired. The women cheer at the agreement and go back to work. Marlene however has overheard Louise and Édouard and tells Alice. She is losing her motivation at being a model in this unsavoury atmosphere.

Late at night, on Laurence's instructions, Alice comes back to the offices to search for clues. She overhears Édouard and Louise discussing. They know the dead woman: she's named Julie. Alice goes to report to Laurence but her scooter has been sabotaged. The front wheel comes off and she is injured. The name "Julie" rings a bell with Laurence: she is an English seamstress who long ago made a complaint against Louise for assault and battery, one of many other women to do so.

Nonetheless all is made ready for the show and it is a great success and Marlene gets to model a revolutionary black mini design. But backstage, Marlene discovers Louise stabbed to death. Next to her, in another drunken stupor is Patricia with bloody scissors in hand.

Patricia is taken away and the case appears solved. But back at the commissariat, Laurence has received a packet. It's from Julie Lemon, sent beforehand "just in case something happens to her". Inside is a page of sketches she has signed off on dated 1947. Marlene recognises Paget's signature black dress from his 1948 collection. So it appears Édouard has stolen Julie's design and built his career from 15 years ago on it.

Meanwhile Alice is coming to the same conclusion. After the show, she seeks out Gigi to say goodbye and comes across her practising her lines like she is the new boss. She says Louise, Patricia and Julie are nothing compared to her. She knows Julie? Alice accuses her of killing Louise and Julie. Édouard appears and agrees. He doesn't mind telling Alice the whole background since she will be the next to die. Yes, he had stolen Julie's designs, fired her and then built his career on it. She had come back to blackmail him and so she had to die. Édouard orders Gigi to kill Alice but Laurence arrives and intervenes.

Laurence explains that Édouard hired Paco Gomez to harass her and then asked Gigi to kill him. Édouard drugged Patricia's liquor flask and had her placed next to Gomez's body to convince her that she had killed him. He alibied Patricia later because Gomez was never the ultimate victim: it was Julie he was targetting. However when Julie was killed, Patricia had an unexpected alibi from Tricard, so Édouard and Gigi had to improvise the killing of Louise to implicate Patricia. Patricia is released for good. Alice and Marlene urge her to carry on with her design work because she truly has a gift. Tricard encourages her to keep on fighting her alcoholism. They agree to meet each other that night for the next meeting of the Alcoholics Anonymous support group.

Comparison with the original story
(may contain spoilers - click on expand to read)
 * The Andrew Restarick/Mary Restarick parallels, Édouard Paget and Gigi, have a dark secret to keep. This involves killing someone. Patricia Nollet, the Norma Restarick parallel, is selected as a convenient person to take the fall. In this respect, the main premise of the original novel has been retained. Other than this, there are differences in the setting, such that exact parallels in the other characters are hard to find.
 * Like in the original, part of the process of getting Patricia to believe she had done the murder involves drugging her. In this adaptation, this is helped because she is already an alcoholic. The drug is put into her flask. She also has a history of violent behaviour and has spent time in a reformatory.

Cast

 * Samuel Labarthe as Swan Laurence
 * Blandine Bellavoir as Alice Avril
 * Élodie Frenck as Marlène Leroy
 * Cyril Gueï as Timothée Glissant
 * Dominique Thomas as Ernest Tricard
 * Eric Beauchamp as Flic Martin

Non-recurring characters

 * Camille Claris as Patricia Nollet
 * Yannik Landrein as Édouard Paget
 * Raphaeline Goupilleau as Louise Charpentier
 * Charline Paul as Gigi
 * Laurent Richard as Narcisse Vermeer
 * Clara Antoons as Françoise Vermeer
 * Emilie Wiest as Julie Lemon
 * Franckie Defonte as Paco Gomez
 * Serge Flamenbaum as Witness of murder
 * Uncredited actress as the Countess du Marier

Filming locations

 * la rue des Clarmes, Tournai, Belgium - alley where first murder takes place.
 * belfry and clock tower of Lille Chamber of Commerce - various high angle positioning shots of town.
 * old Belgian consulate, Rue du Maréchal de Lattre de Tassigny, Lille - the Maison Paget fashion house exteriors.
 * former Banque de France building, Place de la Liberté, Roubaix - the Maison Paget fashion house interiors.
 * Grande brasserie de l'Impératrice Eugénie, Place de la Liberté, Roubaix - bar where Patricia comes often for drinks.
 * La Maison Tournaisienne Musee de Folklore, rue Massenet, Tournai, Belgium - scene of second murder. The name of the museum can be seen on the archway over the street.
 * Ruelle de la Grande Garde, next to the L'ecu de France restaurant, Grande Place, Tournai, Belgium - brick archway over alleyway. Laurence and Patricia take a walk through there.