Leopold Santini

In Mademoiselle Mac Ginty est morte, the France Televisions adaptation of Mrs McGinty's Dead, Dr Leopard Santini is the parallel of Dr Rendell from the original novel. He and his family are residents of a first floor unit at 27 Victor Hugo Boulevard, a block of apartments in Lille where most of the action in the episode takes place. Leopold Santini is portrayed by Serge Riaboukine.

Leopold's nationality is not mentioned. A nameplate at the entrance to the building states that he is a psychoanalyst and that he has a diplome from the Institute of Psychoanalysis at Vienna. At the time of the events in the episode, he and his family had lived in the building only for about 6 months. They had spent some 20 years in Austria and he had met his wife Deborah there.

Leopold was evasive in answering commissaire Laurence's questions about the crime. He constantly tried to convert the interrogation into a psychoanalytic session with statements like "answers are often within us" and wanting to talk about Laurence's own past. For some reason, when Laurence asked about his wife's maiden name, Leopold reacted and terminated the session abruptly and asked him to leave. He firmly denied having any photos of himself or his wife from 20 years ago because they had lost everything when they moved. He also tried hard to ensure that Laurence did not speak to his wife or his daughter.

Throughout the episode, Leopold and his wife gave the impression that they had a dark secret to hide. As Laurence later discovered, it was that their daughter Beatrice was a schizophrenic. As Leopold wryly remarked to Laurence, "The shoemaker's children always go barefoot."