Oliver Manders

In the novel Three Act Tragedy, Oliver Manders is a young man who is in love with "Egg". He was one of the guests at Sir Charles' cocktail party. He is a handsome young man, of about twenty-five years of age, and there is something "a little sleek about his good looks". Mr Satterthwaite notes something "unEnglish" about him, and later realises that Oliver has Jewish blood in him when Egg calls him a "slippery Shylock".

Oliver works at his uncle's office in the city, Messrs Speier & Ross, Old Broad Street, E.C.2. He writes well, and has talked of becoming a journalist, but Egg thinks that is just talk, and that he really wants to get rich.

Oliver's mother had been infatuated with a married man, and they went off together after a lot of scandal. His mother died shortly after he was born, and his uncle in London took charge of him. Oliver divided his time between his uncle and aunt in London, and his grandmother in Loomouth.

Lady Mary Lytton Gore tells Mr Satterthwaite about an incident where Oliver was rude to Rev Stephen Babbington, about two years before the events of the novel. Oliver had said that religious people looked down on him because his father and mother were not married, and that he wanted to sweep away the churches all over the world. He said he hated everything the church stood for, smugness, security, and hypocrisy. Rev Babbington had smiled, and said that even if Oliver did sweep away all the churches, he would still have to reckon with God.

Oliver rides a motorcycle, and has an accident just outside Melfort Abbey on the night of Sir Bartholomew Strange's house party. Sir Bartholomew asks him to stay the night. When Mr Satterthwaite asks him about this, Oliver says that he received a letter from Sir Bartholomew, asking him to fake an accident and claim hospitality at Melfort Abbey. He destroyed the letter, and does not tell the police about it because it seems fantastic.

He also tells Mr Satterthwaite that he had been talking to Muriel Wills on the morning after Sir Bartholomew's death, and had dropped his pocketbook. A newspaper clipping about nicotine had fallen out, and Miss Wills had seen it before she handed it back to him. He had no recollection of putting the clipping into his pocketbook.

At the end of the novel, after the denouement, Egg is very upset, and Oliver arrives to take her home. Poirot tells him to be very good to Egg, and he says that he will, as she is all he cares about in the world.

Portrayals
In Murder in Three Acts (1986), the character was played by Fernando Allende. The character name is changed to "Ricardo Montoya". Here, instead of a motorcycle accident, he had a car breakdown. Similar to the novel, he says that he received a letter from Strange, telling him to fake an accident. In this adaptation, he says that Strange wrote that he should destroy the letter after reading it. Mr Satterthwaite does not appear in this adaptation, and Ricardo visits Poirot to tell him about the letter.

In the film adaptation of Three Act Tragedy in Series 12 of ITV's Agatha Christie's Poirot drama series, the part of Oliver Manders is played by Tom Wisdom. In this adaptation, Oliver visits Poirot to tell him about the letter he received from Strange, and says that he did not tell the police about it, because he had heard that Poirot would be at the party. The newspaper clipping about nicotine is not mentioned. In this adaptation, Poirot asks Oliver why he does not propose to Egg, and he says it is because he does not have any money. At the end of the film, Oliver takes Lady Mary and Egg home.

In Drame en Trois Actes, the France Télévisions adaptation of the novel, there is no definite parallel of Oliver unless he is somewhat similar to the character Grégoire.