The BBC & BritBox Announce Agatha Christie's 'Endless Night' Adaptation

It only took the BBC five years and three Agatha Christie adaptations before it returned to its most recent primary adaptor of Christie novels, Sarah Phelps (The Sixth Commandment). Phelps made herself into something of a U.K. household name after she did a run of five Christie adaptations in five years for Auntie Beeb between 2015 and 2020, the first adaptations to be released post-David Suchet's retirement from ITV's Agatha Christie's Poirot and Julie McKenzie hanging up her Agatha Christie's Marple hat. Now she's picking the pen back up to adapt her sixth Christie story, Endless Night, the first to debut on BritBox.

The most recent spate of Christie miniseries has been made in conjunction with BritBox; however, until the last run, there's no single artist as a throughline, all that ties them together is that the BBC, BritBox, and the Christie estate are involved. Why Didn't They Ask Evans was a Hugh Laurie passion project, Murder Is Easy was the brainchild of Sian Martin (who went on to create Inspector Ellis), and the most recent, Towards Zero, was a joint project between director Sam Yates and World on Fire writer Rachel Bennette. Until now, the only thing the stories had in common was that they were "Superintendent Battle Books with Battle removed," but Endless Night doesn't even have that to tie it back.

Instead, Endless Night is part of Christie's collection of "detective-free novels," much like the ones Phelps chose to adapt previously (only one of her five adaptations featured one of Christie's famous figures). Without a Marple/Poirot/Beresford to anchor them, most of Phelps' adaptations failed to find an audience in the U.S.; however, that is as much due to most of them streaming on Amazon Prime (BritBox didn't exist yet in 2015), which at the time was aping Netflix's "If we don't market it, they'll show up anyway" method, leaving Phelps' Christies to sit unwatched. 

(This disastrous decision is one of the many reasons Amazon, a widely subscribed to and readily available streaming service, is still mired among the lowest viewership for most of its releases.)

Here's the story's synopsis:

It’s 1967 and man-of-many-trades Michael Rogers finds himself working as chauffeur for the enigmatic designer du jour Rudolf Santonix, snatching a glimpse into a glamorous world of outrageous wealth that's far from his upbringing. Transfixed by Santonix’s latest project, a beautiful house in the English countryside, Mike dreams of meeting the love of his life and taking up residence.

But unbeknownst to Mike, the house he has set his heart on has a dark past that goes back centuries. Local legend says it is haunted by a curse that no one escapes. When Mike meets the sweet-natured Ellie and, by a curious set of circumstances, finds himself moving into the house, the young couple start to realise they should have listened to the warnings. As increasingly strange and chilling events occur, they start to wonder if the curse is real and meant to destroy them. Or, that someone is intent on terrifying them to death. A ghost story and a love story, Endless Night is about obsession and the darkness that lurks in us all when we want too much.

There is no cast attached to the project at this time. However, the return of Phelps to the scripting process is a major move by the BBC, which is looking to juice iPlayer numbers in 2026, ahead of the new charter, and wants to make BritBox a showcase of what it can do internationally. Bringing back the woman behind some of the more popular Christie adaptations in recent years, including And Then There Were None, The ABC Murders, and The Pale Horse, and putting her newest adaptation on BritBox in the States seems like a good way to produce both results with one series.

As part of the press release announcing the project, Phelps said: “I’m so excited to be teaming up again with ACL, Mammoth Screen and the BBC for Endless Night. One of Agatha Christie’s last novels, this is a chilling story of love, sex, deceit, and death, of how far we’ll go to get our heart's desire and what we’ll do when night falls and the wolves start circling."

The new series will run three installments, all penned by Phelps. No director has been announced as yet, but the series will be executive produced by Phelps, James Prichard for Agatha Christie Limited, Rebecca Durbin & Damien Timmer for Mammoth Screen, Danielle Scott-Haughton for the BBC, and Robert Schildhouse, Jon Farrar & Stephen Nye for BritBox.

Endless Night will begin filming in mid-2025, with plans to release on the BBC, followed by BritBox, in early 2026.