Whodunnit: Get ready for a dose of murder this weekend

Here's why you should make And Then There Were None a priority on your list of shows to watch!

Period drama? Tick. Crime? Tick. Amazing actors? Tick. Based on a novel? Tick. Highly engrossing and entertaining? Tick and tick! If you're big fans of Agatha Christie (and how can you not be?) then you should be as delighted as we are that the gripping new murder mystery series based on her novel (voted the world's favourite) And Then There Were None has been adapted by Sarah Phelps (The Casual Vacancy, Great Expectations) and directed by award winning Craig Viveiros.
Ten strangers are on an isolated rock off the Devon coast. The weather sours and they find themselves cut off from the rest of civilization. And to make matters worse, there is a murderer in their midst. They must work together if they hope to uncover the murderer. But they have to be quick as they are each being picked off, one by one. The question remains... who can you trust, and who can you not?
The story isn't the only thing to get excited about. The illustrious cast is impressive. Aidan Turner (Poldark, The Hobbit Trilogy), Maeve Dermody (Black Water, Beautiful Kate) Toby Stephens (Black Sails, Jane Eyre, Lost in Space), Sam Neill (Peaky Blinders, The Tudors).
It's going to be good. Believe us. From the set design, the psychology of the characters and the tradition of murder mystery shows we spoke to some of the cast about why you should make And Then There Were None a priority on your list of shows to watch!
And Then There Were None starts on September 15 on BBC First Middle East at 20:00
Maeve Dermody is Vera Claythorne
Australian actress Maeve Dermody was in Burma when she heard she had landed the role of Vera Claythorne and flew straight to the UK to begin work with a dialect coach.
"It does come quite naturally to me, I think I have a good ear and I've done a few plays in theatre with an English accent," she explains.
The role of Vera attracted Maeve from the start.
"She has everything going on, she is so complicated and unexpected. You're surprised by her and what her life has been. The script was incredibly strong - it's period but feels contemporary, raw and fierce - and it's just such a good female role."
Her past is tainted by the death of the child she was governess to.
"Vera was his main carer; he's a little boy whose father has died so he is the prize of his mother's life. He has an Uncle Hugo who Vera falls in love with and he's very tied into their lives. He lost his inheritance essentially because Cyril was born; he would have inherited his brother's property and money, but Cyril was born just as Hugo's brother died, so he then lost it all but is very good natured about it all."
Was the story familiar to Maeve?
"I have read crime fiction before but I wasn't well trained in the English murder mystery tradition. With TV shows I tend to pick it up, but I was quite surprised when reading the script. I think it's credit to Sarah Phelps's script; it's really finely balanced."
"It's a really clever mystery and a study of humanity when you put 10 people together of various backgrounds on an island and reveal the biggest events in their life and then let it play out. Psychologically, that is such rich material. And it helped being isolated in the big location house, it really made you feel how it might have been stuck there, although our ensemble cast were incredible, such a gift. Being around all these great actors made me want to step up and be better."
Aidan Turner is Philip Lombard
For Aidan Turner the prospect of playing a character who is the antithesis of Cornish hero Ross Poldark was a great start.
"It was a nice change to play somebody who doesn't really care about anyone but himself."
A self-proclaimed Agatha Christie fan he says: "It's a very clear story with unique, independent characters who have their own agendas, so from the offset its very clear what's happening even though there is ambiguity about the plot. It's a genre I haven't really done before so everything appealed to me for this one. It is a rite of passage for British actors to be in an Agatha Christie adaptation and this is the quintessential Christie story albeit a really dark one."
Discussing his character in And Then There Were None, Aidan reveals Lombard is an Irish mercenary with a shady past.
"He enters the house and is the only one carrying a pistol and as the writer, Sarah Phelps said there's nothing more frightening than an Irish guy in 1939 with a gun!
"He's totally shady. He's kind of amoral as well and has a complete disregard for humanity. There's nothing he wouldn't do, I wouldn't put anything past him. He's a nasty kind of guy and you get the impression he's done some horrible things in his life and he's not really regretful of any of them."
Aidan was particularly impressed with the 1930's set. "Once you walk onto set and it's dressed, it just looks immaculate and beautiful and very much of that time. You feel like you're in that world." 
Sam Neill is General MacArthur
New Zealander Sam Neill is bemused by the British love of murder - on the TV that is.
"There is something the British find in middle class murder that isn't frightening or even titillating but on the contrary rather comforting."
Talking about his character in And Then There Were None Sam explains General MacArthur is a man haunted by his past.
"I always think that most Agatha Christie murderers have done things against their better nature, and if you do things like this you are much more likely to be wracked with guilt and regret than someone who is an out and out villain. And love will make you do crazy things sometimes.
"As for so many millions of others, the battles of the First World War took their toll on him - there wasn't anyone that came out of that war undamaged. He is a damaged man.
"This book is set on the cusp of the Second World War and that must have been very much on Agatha Christie's mind when she wrote this book. This stands for what's happened and what came out of Europe was a lot of damaged men and an even worse war."
But Sam readily admits he had no idea of the story when he read Sarah Phelps' script.
"It seemed like fun at first with the drawing room murder feel but it takes a darker turn than you might normally expect. I very much wanted to know what happened though - I thought it could be one of them or an outside agency. Thrilling stuff."
Toby Stephens is Dr. Edward Armstrong
There's more than meets the eye with the character of Dr. Edward Armstrong which attracted Toby Stephens to the role.
"I like playing roles that are conflicted and who are not necessarily nice people but are people you end up feeling that you understand their perplexities by the end. "With Armstrong I felt like he's just one of those people you meet initially and think he's a horrible man, he's sort of priggish, arrogant, smug, slightly conceited and then you realise actually he's this tragic character that because of his past has been ruined, his life has been blighted."
This is something he feels stretches across all of the characters in this adaptation of And Then There were None and is what makes them interesting.
"Initially you look at them and think they're all just really unpleasant people but when you get to know them deeper the reasons why they are unpleasant people are revealed to the audience and it gives you a certain amount of empathy with the characters and their predicament. Toby further explains what makes this specific Agatha Christie adaptation so different from the others.
"This version immediately struck me as different, it was much darker and I found the script really well written and well constructed. It's a clever piece of plotting; it has a real sense to it like a mechanism that works in a very satisfying way like a needle in a clock. It isn't something I would normally associate with Agatha Christie because it's so dark." Being a part of an all star cast was a new experience that Toby enjoyed.
"I've never worked with any of the cast before and they're all fantastic actors and because everyone is so good around you, you end up doing great work and it's just satisfying on many different levels."