Every Hercule Poirot Actor Ranked

In 1920, much-adapted mystery author Agatha Christie debuted Hercule Poirot in the novel “The Mysterious Affair at Styles.” Poirot was introduced as a Belgian private detective, a short man with an immaculately groomed mustache and a metric ton of dignity. He solved the toughest murder cases for his friends, colleagues, and employers, giving Sherlock Holmes and Batman alike a run for “world’s greatest detective.”

Since then, Poirot has become one of the most iconic and influential cultural characters; without Poirot, there is no Columbo, no Dr. House, no Benoit Blanc, and no understanding of the idea of the “gentleman sleuth.” Poirot’s impact invariably led to screen adaptations for film, television, video game, and even anime.

If you’re a fan of the French-accented detective, or love the mystery genre in general and want to know where to start with Monsieur Poirot, lock the room and gather all your rich friend suspects, because all will now be revealed. This is every Hercule Poirot actor, ranked.

Two video games centering the famous French detective have been released: 2021’s “Agatha Christie – Hercule Poirot: The First Cases” and its 2023 sequel, “The London Case.” Both were developed by indie company Blazing Griffin, and if you’re seriously jonesing for some detective simulation action, these games are functional and even charming in some of their quirky limitations. But the limitations are ample and stiff, including, unfortunately, in its leading performance.

It feels a little cruel to pick on indie games and voice actors like this, but Will De Renzy-Martin, who’s worked on all kinds of titles like “Baldur’s Gate III,” does not possess a ton of juice in his take on the sleuth. The French accent is subtle, lilting atop the dialogue as mild seasoning. Subtlety can be appreciated, but when combined with the rest of the game’s dryness, it plays as dispassionate and flavorless.

Perhaps the performance would work better in an on-camera take, but the neutral voice combined with the low-budget animation comes together to make a half-baked dish.

Tony Randall is a beloved comic actor, famously starring as the fastidious Felix in the TV adaptation of Neil Simon’s classic play “The Odd Couple.” But before that role, he took on Poirot in 1965’s “The Alphabet Murders.” But there was a twist! Rather than a straight-ahead murder mystery or thriller, director Frank Tashlin’s work was a slapstick spoof, a silly comedy drenched in the goofball ’60s rhythms you might find in the similar genre parodies of the time, like “The Pink Panther” or the 1967 “Casino Royale.”

Thus, Randall plays Poirot like a buffoon, a stumbling high-status blowhard who has more in common with, like, Will Ferrell doing a French accent than one of the world’s greatest detectives. It is, without a doubt, entertaining, especially for fans of this kind of kitschy era of ultra-broad comedy (and doubly so if you want a mildly satirical love letter to the mystery genre). But examined within the context of a reverent, accurate take on the literary hero, it just can’t place higher than this. Merde!

Austin Trevor is the first actor to ever play Hercule Poirot on screen, acting in a trio of 1930s films: “Alibi,” “Black Coffee,” and “Lord Edgware Dies”. Thus, he’s a member of cinematic history, a feat paid honor to with a small role in the previously mentioned “Alphabet Murders.” However, two of these films, “Alibi” and “Black Coffee,” are essentially unavailable to watch, becoming a pair of mythical “lost films.” That leaves “Lord Edgware Dies” as the only case study, and what do we find when we examine the clues?

Unfortunately, at least to this modern viewer, Trevor’s work doesn’t offer much staying power beyond historical value. His French accent, for one, plays with more cartoonish exaggeration than Randall’s, with each syllable turning into a serpentine, multisyllabic assault on the senses. And he doesn’t even have a mustache!

Beyond these admittedly superficial quibbles, Trevor’s Poirot feels oversimplified and sullen among the details of the case, like a piece of wood that a strong current flows past. Sometimes that’s functionally helpful, as his co-stars often play with melodramatic flavor that demands grounding. But generally, though I thank him for his service, Trevor’s take does not compel.

As you might imagine from the actor’s streak of villainous roles, John Malkovich cuts a particularly severe, even menacing Hercule Poirot in the 2018 BBC miniseries “The ABC Murders,” a much more serious take on the same material adapted for Tony Randall’s ’60s spoof. This is certainly by design, as the work (written by Sarah Phelps, who’s adapted quite a number of Christie books for television) portrays a more distraught Poirot under siege by a murderer with genuine menace. But it can result in a one-note, grimdark feeling piece, with Malkovich not doing enough to lend it texture.

Despite taking place in the period it was originally written in, “ABC Murders” feels like a modernization of the canon, not unlike the 21st-century “Sherlock” series. As such, Malkovich avoids any of the campier aspects of the character, sporting a neatly shorn goatee and adding just a touch of French to his traditionally eccentric timbre (frankly, just enough to be distracting). It works for the piece as a whole, turning the three-episode piece into a lively, intentional, and streamlined thriller. But it flattens Poirot, losing an essential element of joie de vivre in the process.

Here’s a fun fact: Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot is so popular, so globally beloved, that they made an anime about him!

“Agatha Christie’s Great Detectives Poirot and Marple” debuted in 2004, helmed by Naohito Takahashi (“Berserk”) and starring prolific Japanese actor Kōtarō Satomi as Poirot, with Kaoru Yachigusa portraying the title’s other great Agatha Christie detective, Miss Marple. The show takes place in early 20th-century England and features a new character, Miss Marple’s grand-niece Mabel (Fumiko Orikasa), who connects Agatha Christie’s great detectives as they solve these classic mysteries.

The resulting show is charming as all get out, with a delightful, family-friendly animation style giving room for lots of organic flights of whimsy to help balance the mystery plots’ seriousness (my favorite? Mabel’s pet duck that keeps getting in the way of cases, tee hee). And Satomi voices the detective with ample dignity, honoring the character and playing his truth no matter what stylized shenanigans are interrupting the more traditional Christie facets of the show.

“Murder by the Book,” a TV special released in 1987 (also the name of a “Columbo” episode directed by Steven Spielberg), is a delightful and intriguing piece of meta-fictional interrogation from writer Nick Evans (“The Horse Whisperer”). In it, Agatha Christie herself is the main character, played by Peggy Ashcroft (“When the Wind Blows”). She is finally considering publishing a lost manuscript in which she kills off her beloved detective, Hercule Poirot. But who should show up at her doorstep to protest? Hercule Poirot himself, played by Bilbo Baggins himself, Ian Holm.

It’s an interesting acting challenge for Holm; he’s playing a textually fictional character created by, in the world of the text, his scene partner. But he’s playing him as though he’s flesh and blood – and he’s also playing popular culture’s understanding and love of the character! How does he pull it off?

I gotta say, pretty dang well! Holm is clearly having fun with the inherent comedy of the premise, turning the detective into a fussy, existentially annoyed foil for Christie (and his mustache is a work of art). But he also gets at an inherent truth of the character, and of all humans – we need to survive, but we desperately want to leave something behind. Watching Holm reckon with this is ever entertaining.

If you know one Hercule Poirot book, it’s “Murder on the Orient Express.” And in 2001, the oft-adapted work got a CBS TV movie starring Alfred Molina (“Spider-Man 2” among his best movies, of course) as the detective solving a murder on a train.

Prolific TV movie writer Stephen Harrigan set his adaptation in a contemporary setting, and Molina modernizes the character quite expertly. His accent is refined, his countenance is grounded (which is very fun when contrasted with the blunt Americans on the train), and his observations thread the needle between solemn duty and fulfilled curiosity.

It’s a compelling performance in a compelling, underrated adaptation. Molina’s quietude is much appreciated; he makes the audience lean in and makes us want to see the case from his perspective, as opposed to other Poirot adaptations that leave the detective as a sort of exalted alien to observe from a safe distance. And when Molina does let a little twinkle out – a raised eyebrow here, a smug self-congratulation there – it reverberates volumes.

Speaking of “Murder on the Orient Express,” in 1974, the always prepared Sidney Lumet (“12 Angry Men,” “Network,” so much more) adapted the work into a splashy, star-studded affair. Lauren Bacall, Sean Connery, Ingrid Bergman – all of these icons and more packed into the train to be judged by the suave but irascible Hercule Poirot, played by one of our great eyebrow actors: Albert Finney.

You may know Finney from works like “Miller’s Crossing,” “Big Fish,” and Lumet’s last film, “Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead.” He tends to strike a balance between Actors Studio-esque intensity and “play to the cheap seats” theatricality, a close-up and a wide shot actor simultaneously. As such, his Poirot’s investment in the case hits you viscerally; there’s less of a “puzzlemaker’s fascination” in his discussion of the facts and more of a personal interest in catching lies and instilling justice.

He’s a detective on his toes rather than his heels, giving the picture life and vitality, especially when it threatens to lurch into the bloated comforts of similarly star-studded ’70s genre pictures of the era.

Speaking of “Murder on the Orient Express” yet again, famed director/actor/Shakespeare ambassador Kenneth Branagh brought Hercule Poirot to the 21st century with a trilogy of films: 2017’s “Murder on the Orient Express,” 2022’s “Death on the Nile,” and 2023’s “A Haunting in Venice.”

Like Lumet, Branagh stuffs his movies with as many stars as possible, and, well, some of them simply aren’t up for the job. But Branagh delivers consistently great performance work, even if the machinations around him can overwhelm the viewer with the modern types of “noise” you find in blockbusters these days. You can tell this character is important to Branagh, and he gives himself a lot of room to examine the different shades of and motivations for Mr. Poirot (including, both charmingly and inexplicably, an origin story for his famous mustache).

One final plea to the reader: you don’t need to watch Branagh’s first two Poirot films, but you need to watch “A Haunting in Venice.” It’s gripping, beautifully made, and exceptionally performed. Branagh has a sneakily successful track record as a horror/thriller director (shout out “Dead Again”), and the infusion of that genre into this story gives it such juice. It’s a low-key masterpiece and maybe Branagh’s best movie – and just maybe the best Hercule Poirot movie.

Sir Peter Ustinov, whom you might know from Stanley Kubrick’s much-loved “Spartacus,” played Hercule Poirot six times, in three theatrical films and three television films, over a period of eight years (that’s 75% of a Poirot per year). As such, it’s uniquely satisfying to watch the differences and growth in his takes, and doubly comforting to see what stays the same.

Ustinov plays into the pleasant intellectualism of the character, even touching areas of “suaveness.” His French accent is luxurious, his relationship to the case is enthusiastic, and his mustache is beautifully waxed.

Ustinov’s first Poirot, 1978’s “Death on the Nile,” also falls into the camp of “overstuffed ’70s genre picture,” with supporting players like Bette Davis, Mia Farrow, and Angela Lansbury there to complicate things. But instead of playing against this particular energy, Ustinov leans in, enjoying the splendor, highlighting the opulence, and making the gamesmanship of solving a murder case pleasurable. Watching Ustinov play Poirot through the years is like having a warm cup of tea; it’s a sigh of relief and a smile on one’s face.

When I think of Hercule Poirot, I think of English actor David Suchet. He is the definitive detective.

Over 13 seasons (produced over a period of 24 years), Suchet starred in the ITV show “Agatha Christie’s Poirot,” which adapted pretty much every single Christie Poirot novel into a handsomely made piece of television (including, yes, “Murder on the Orient Express”). It ends with an episode called “Curtain: Poirot’s Last Case,” and when I think about it, I get emotional.

Suchet gives Poirot an ample amount of dignity, playing his vast intelligence as the reason to open doors, rather than shut them, on all matters of existence. Viewers get the sense that his detective would have an opinion on any piece of culture you asked him about, and would gladly go into detail. But his Poirot is  entirely human, guilty of being prickly, selfish, smug, and annoyingly referring to himself in the third person (though never, according to Suchet himself, “funny”). These details give Suchet’s performance immense texture, allowing his character to avoid the trappings of many procedural TV detectives, becoming the most interesting person in the room wherever he goes.

Perhaps it’s a bias of volume, given the sheer number of times he’s played the character. But for my francs, there is no Hercule Poirot quite like David Suchet.