The Times - UK (2021-11-10)

the times | Wednesday November 10 2021 3

News

They can be found across Britain, ne-
glected on street corners and country
lanes, but all hope is not lost for public
phone boxes.
About 5,000 public phones are ex-
pected to be saved from removal by BT
under rules being drawn up by Ofcom,
the telecoms regulator, to ensure areas
with high accident rates or poor mobile
signals stay connected.
Ofcom acknowledged that phone
boxes were fast becoming relics. It said
that there were 1,298 phone boxes that
did not make a call last year: 841 in
England, 166 in Wales, 220 in Scotland
and 71 in Northern Ireland. More than
4,000 made fewer than one call a
month.
Selina Chadha, Ofcom’s director of
connectivity, told the BBC Radio 4
Toda y programme: “We’ve got some
payphones that haven’t actually been
used for the last 12 months, even 24

Mobile phone footage filmed by his

wife Sarah, 36, a nurse, shows Meek-

com calmly telling them: “I’m terminal-

ly ill, I won’t be able to breathe like this.

“This is ridiculous — I moonied a

speed camera. I moonied a speed

camera.”

A policewoman can be heard reply-

ing: “Well that is a significant statement

that you have just made to us.”

Meekcom then says: “I’m quite happy

to say that because it was one off my

bucket list. I’ve just been diagnosed

with multiple system atrophy. I’m

terminally ill, I’ve got a very short time

to live and it was one off my bucket list.

Have you never wanted to moonie a

speed camera? Well I did.”

He was later released from custody

on suspicion of indecent exposure and

dangerous driving as he left the scene of

the camera van. West Mercia Police

said: “Inquiries are ongoing.”

of which left Agatha Christie Limited

with £17.7 million revenues last year de-

spite the closure of theatres and cine-

mas, and profits before tax of more than

£10 million. Revenues were £14.4 mil-

lion in 2019 and £26.7 million in 2018.

Prichard said they were already plan-

ning for a post-copyright future, with

the films and continuation novels

having their own copyrights.

And with Christie now available on

gaming platforms, small screens and

large screens and in a panoply of liter-

ary forms, could we ever have too much

Agatha?

“I do worry about it, but I think

chance would be a fine thing. The com-

plication of developing things will see

to it that we will not reach that point,”

he insisted.

Mooning a speed camera

on dying man’s bucket list

Cameron Charters

Call goes out to save phone boxes

months, and having services and equip-

ment out there that isn’t being used,

frankly, costs us all money. So, actually,

we only want to protect those that are

needed.”

Now that 96 per cent of UK adults

own a mobile, phone boxes are asso-

ciated more with drug deals and prosti-

tutes’ cards, but Ofcom said thousands

still provided a vital service.

Under rules put out to a consultation,

Ofcom proposes stopping BT decom-

missioning payphones if they are at an

accident or suicide hotspot or have

been used for more than one call a week

over the past year. Phone boxes will

also be kept in “other exceptional cir-

cumstances”, such as being at a coastal

location with poor mobile coverage, or

if there is evidence it is used to make

calls to helplines such as the

Samaritans.

BT must by law provide public pay-

phones around the UK, alongside

KCOM, which operates Hull’s distinc-

tive cream-coloured phone boxes.

The UK’s phone network is moving

over to digital lines: the analogue net-

work will be switched off by December

2025. BT and KCOM must therefore
      upgrade phone boxes. About two thirds
      of BT’s are unprofitable, making a loss
      of £4.5 million last year.
      BT said it welcomed the consultation
      and looked forward to “working con-
      structively with Ofcom”.

Tom Knowles
Technology Correspondent

A retired university lecturer was

arrested by six police officers in his back

garden for baring his bottom at a speed

camera, an act he said was on his “buck-

et list” of things to do before he died.

Darrell Meekcom, 55, drew up the list

at his wife’s suggestion after being told

last month that he had multiple system

atrophy. He also has Parkinson’s Dis-

ease, heart disease and failing kidneys.

Among the items was to “moon” a

speed camera, which he says he did last

Friday when he showed his bottom to a

mobile camera van in Kidderminster,

Worcestershire. Police reported him for

indecent exposure.

Later that day he says three police

cars pulled up outside his home. When

he refused access, officers kicked down

the garden gate before wrestling him to

the ground outside to handcuff him.

Agatha Christie’s creations are still
proving highly lucrative, with new Miss
Marple short stories, a Hugh Laurie
television adaptation, a big-budget
Hollywood film and a computer game
in the pipeline.
Not to forget the long-running plays,
the full-length “continuation” novels,
the recent and upcoming movies and a
smattering of mugs, silk scarves and
tote bags.
So, yes, the controller of the grande
dame of crime fiction’s estate admits,
there is a danger of “saturation”. But
what he is more concerned about is the
flood of stuff that will emerge when
copyright runs out.
James Prichard, the chairman
of Agatha Christie Limited and a
great-grandson of the author, said
the estate was prepared for the day,
which in Britain will be in 2047,
when everybody will have free
rein to create adaptations.
“There will be a lot of very
different adaptations,
some of which I imagine
will be brilliant and some
of which will be less bril-
liant,” he said. “We will
do what we can until
then. And I would hope we
still have a role past that date
for other reasons — like that
we know what we are doing.”

Whodunit?

Before long

it’ll be who

hasn’t dun it?

Prichard was speaking before the

launch of the first Death on the Nile

mobile game, developed by the British

company Outplay Entertainment,

which gives players the opportunity to

solve the mystery alongside the Belgian

detective.

Expected next year are a Miss

Marple short story collection featuring

tales by Val McDermid and Kate

Mosse, among others, and a Hugh Lau-

rie three-episode adaptation of Why

Didn’t They Ask Evans? for Britbox,

starring Emma Thompson and Jim

Broadbent.

The world’s longest-running play,

The Mousetrap, continues in London:

Prichard said this week he thought it

would “go on for ever”. It has been

joined in the capital’s theatres by Wit-

ness for the Prosecution.

There are also the BBC and Amazon

adaptations of The Definitive Christies,

the French series Les Petits Meurtres

d’Agatha Christie, a Swedish production

revolving around Sven Hjerson — a

fictional detective created by

Ariadne Oliver, a crime writer

who appears in some of Christie’s

novels — burgeoning book sales

in China and elsewhere and a

fourth Poirot continuation

novel.

Next year a new ver-

sion of Death on the

Nile, directed by Ken-

neth Branagh and

starring Gal Gadot

and Annette Ben-

ing, should come to

cinemas, and film

adaptations of Wit-

ness for the Prosecution

and And Then There Were

None are also planned. All

Agatha Christie’s estate

expects ‘saturation’

when the copyright on

her books runs out,

writes David Sanderson

Some phone boxes have not been

used at all in the past two years

He said that while

he understood con-

cerns over the Holly-

wood-led “obsession

with prequels and sequels”,

he was confident Christie’s

“extraordinary stories” would al-

ways have a place in life.

“Particularly now there is a re-

engagement and resurgence in the

crime and mystery genre with films like

Knives Out. Until she is replaced as the

greatest exponent of [crime and mys-

tery], we will have a place,” he said.

“One of my missions in life is to share

my great-grandmother’s stories with as

many people, and to some extent in as

many ways, as we can.”

Christie’s whodunits are a marvel for

stage and screen, leading article, page 27

Big screen Murder on the Orient

Express and Death on the Nile. In

2017 Kenneth Branagh directed and

starred in the former. The latter,

delayed because of the pandemic, is

due for release in 2022. Studios

have taken options on Witness for

the Prosecution and And Then

There Were None.

Small screen The BBC and Amazon

have teamed up to create The

Classic Christies after signing a

2017 deal with the estate.

Ordeal by Innocence, The

ABC Murders and The Pale

Horse have already been

broadcast. There is also a French

programme, in its third series, Les

Petits Meurtres d’Agatha Christie,

and a separate Swedish drama.

Hugh Laurie’s adaptation of

Why Didn’t They Ask Evans? is

due to be released on Britbox

next year.

Books There were already 66

novels and 14 short story collections

written by Christie before her

death in 1976 — her estate claims

she has been outsold by only the

Bible and Shakespeare. Sophie

Hannah is due to release her

fourth Hercule Poirot

“continuation” novel next

year, and a Miss Marple

short story collection

written by a variety

of novelists is also

due to be

published.

Stage The

Mousetrap is

already the

world’s longest-

running play with

its London

residency, and

other productions

have also been staged

around the world. It has

been joined by Witness

for the Prosecution, in

County Hall.

Games Death on the Nile by

Outplay Entertainment joins a

burgeoning library of Christie

computer games. Last month a

Cluedo-like box game, The Mystery

of Hunter’s Lodge, was released.

Players are asked by Poirot’s

favourite police officer, Captain

Arthur Hastings, to solve the

“perplexing murder of philanthropic

millionaire Harrington Pace”.

Murder on the Orient Express and Poirot have had plenty of

remakes. Hugh Laurie, left, is adapting a Christie book for TV

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