Joanna Lumley as Dolly Bantry
Dolly Bantry is the wife of Colonel Arthur Bantry and a friend of Jane Marple. She and her husband lived at Gossington Hall in St. Mary Mead.
Dolly was devoted to her husband and her garden - not necessarily in that order. She and Arthur had four children, two sons and two daughters all of whom were grown up and had left home before the Bantrys moved to St. Mary Mead. After Arthur's death, Dolly sold Gossington Hall using the proceeds to modernise the East Lodge which she kept to live in and to travel and visit her far-flung children. She has four children; two sons and two daughters. One of them lives in Kenya, one in South Africa, one near Texas and the fourth in London. By the time of The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side, she has nine grandchildren.
In The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side, Dolly attends a fête held at Gossington Hall, hosted by Marina Gregg and her husband Jason Rudd. Dolly is invited upstairs for a private reception. She witnesses Marina Gregg greeting Heather Badcock, and notices Marina's face take on a frozen look as Heather is speaking to her. Dolly likens this look to The Lady of Shalott.
In two of the short stories from The Thirteen Problems, she is jokingly called Scheherazade by Sir Henry Clithering. This is a nod to the character of the same name from One Thousand and One Nights.
Appearances[]
- The Thirteen Problems (1932)
- The Body in the Library (1942)
- The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side (1962)
- Sleeping Murder (1976)
Portrayals[]
Actresses Gwen Watford, Margaret Courtenay, and Joanna Lumley have portrayed Dolly Bantry.
In the BBC "Miss Marple" series, Dolly Bantry was played by Gwen Watford. She appeared in "The Body in the Library" (1984) as well as "The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side" (1992).
In the ITV series "Agatha Christie's Marple", Dolly Bantry was played by Joanna Lumley. She appeared in "The Body in the Library" (2004) and "The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side" (2010).