The Mystery of Edwin Drood

Originally made for the BBC and broadcast on PBS's Masterpiece Classic in the U.S., this latest attempt to tackle Charles Dickens's final, unfinished novel comes up with an inventive (if not exactly Dickensian) resolution. Matthew Rhys plays John Jasper, opium-addicted choir master and uncle to Edwin (Freddie Fox), a likable if sometimes insufferable beneficiary of a small trust. To complicate matters, Edwin is betrothed to Jasper's beautiful young student, Rosa Bud (Tamzin Merchant), whom Jasper is so infatuated with that he dreams of strangling Edwin. Sure enough a death by strangulation occurs, but that's just the beginning of a tale that features a missing corpse, the sudden appearance of two orphans from India, and the unsettling transformation of Jasper into an overbearing stalker. Alun Armstrong co-stars as Hiram Grewgious, Rosa's guardian, who turns detective when suspicion falls on Neville Landless (Sacha Dhawan), the hot-tempered Indian ward of the local priest. British crime writer Gwyneth Hughes scripted this version, offering a third act that is as much beholden to modern psychology and contemporary British TV mystery as it is to the standard Dickensian themes of bloodlines, legitimacy, and the barriers of class and culture. Director Diarmuid Lawrence deftly shifts the story into a shadowy Gothic register in the second half of this adaptation that is entertaining as both a murder mystery and a Victorian drama. Recommended. (S. Axmaker)