Stars: Ian Carmichael, Glyn Houston, David Rintoul, Michael Sheard, Robert James

Director: Robert Tronson

Summary: Lord Peter finds more to his holiday in Scotland when he begins to investigate the death of a local artist. Foul play is suspected when evidence is found to be missing from the body... Based on the Dorothy L. Sayers' novel.

The classic BBC adaptation of Dorothy L. Sayers's detective novels sees Lord Peter Wimsey's fishing holiday in Scotland interrupted when a local artist is found murdered. Wimsey (Ian Carmichael) must employ his master sleuth skills to divine the killer from a list of six likely suspects.

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Based on the series of novels written by Dorothy L Sayers in the 1920s and 30s, Lord Peter Wimseywas dramatised for TV by the BBC between 1972-5. Ian Carmichael, veteran of British film comedy, played the genial, aristocratic sleuth; Glyn Houston was his manservant Bunter. The pair are similar to PG Wodehouse's Jeeves and Bertie Wooster (whom Carmichael played in an earlier TV adaptation) though here the duo are equal in intelligence, breezing about the country together in Wimsey's Bentley and stumbling with morbid regularity upon baffling murder mysteries to test their wits.

Those for whom this series forms hazy memories of childhood might be surprised at its somewhat stagy, lingering interior shots, the spartan paucity of music, the miserly attitude towards locations, especially foreign ones, and the rather genteel, leisurely pace of these programmes, besides which Inspector Morseseems like Quentin Tarantino in comparison. It seems that initially the BBC was reluctant to commission the series and ventured on production with a wary eye on the budget. The Britain depicted by Sayers is, by and large, populated by either the upper classes or heavily accented, rum-do-and-no-mistake lower orders, which some might find consoling. However, the acting is generally excellent and the murder mysteries are sophisticated parlour games, the televisual equivalent of a good, absorbing jigsaw puzzle.

There were five feature-length adaptations in all. "Five Red Herrings" is the last and perhaps the least of the series, involving a trout fishing holiday interrupted by the death of a local artist. --David Stubbs

Main Language:	English
Region:	Region 2
Special Features:	Interactive Menus, Ian Carmichael Interview, Scene Indexing, Biographies
Year:	1975
Release Date:	December 27, 2001
Runtime:	220 minutes
Certification:
Catalogue Number:	A V 9228
Keywords:	Five, Peter, Two, Red, General, Mystery, Lord, Tv, Drama, Discs, Whodunnit, Wimsey, Herrings
Genre:	Mystery/Whodunnit