The Thursday Murder Club: 15 Behind-The-Scenes Secrets You Probably Never Knew

Dame Helen Mirren, Sir Ben Kingsley, Pierce Brosnan and Celia Imrie in The Thursday Murder ClubAfter spending almost a week at the top of Netflix’s most-watched film ranking, it’s safe to say viewers have been flocking to stream the long-awaited screen adaptation of Richard Osman’s best-selling mystery novel The Thursday Murder Club.The cosy murder mystery movie features a star-studded cast led by Dame Helen Mirren, Pierce Brosnan, Sir Ben Kingsley and Celia Imrie, who play a group of retired, amateur sleuths who dedicate their spare time to solving cold murder cases.Critical reaction to the film has been somewhat positive, and it seems there may already be a very real possibility of sequels in the future.If you were among those charmed by The Thursday Murder Club – which also features the likes of Naomi Ackie, David Tennant and Daniel Mays among its A-list cast – you’ll probably find the many tidbits from behind the scenes just as interesting…The Thursday Murder Club’s director quickly noticed parallels between his latest film and his work on Harry PotterIn case you weren’t aware, The Thursday Murder Club was helmed by Chris Columbus, the man behind the camera of hugely popular movies like Home Alone, Mrs. Doubtfire and the first two Harry Potter films.And as it turns out, the casting process for this movie was surprisingly similar to the beloved wizarding franchise. That’s because all of his first choices for The Thursday Murder Club cast said yes immediately.Harry Potter director Chris Columbus on the set of The Chamber Of Secrets with Rupert Grint and Daniel Radcliffe“On Harry Potter, there was no convincing to be done. Maybe a little convincing with Richard Harris, but only because it was his granddaughter who convinced him to do it,” he explained to Town & Country. “But [for The Thursday Murder Club], all of our first choices said yes, that hasn’t happened to me in 20 years.”And that wasn’t the only way this experience resembled his time working on the adaptation of JK Rowling’s iconic books. “When I read The Thursday Murder Club, I got that feeling that I had when I first read Harry Potter,” he told Games Radar.Chris Columbus wanted to create the ’Hogwarts’ of retirement communities for The Thursday Murder ClubChris made sure to tap into all that Harry Potter experience on his CV, as he explained in a press briefing for the film how he wanted the ornate Coopers Chase retirement village to be the “the Hogwarts version of a retirement community”, according to House Beautiful.He wanted it to not only be a beautiful space with stunning architecture, but an aspirational place that people actually wanted to go to.“We wanted Coopers Chase to be a sort of wish fulfillment retirement community, somewhere that audiences who saw the movie would say ‘I’d love to spend the last 15 to 20 years of my life in a place like this’,” he shared.Chris Columbus was hoping to recreate some of his Harry Potter magic with the exteriors he picked for The Thursday Murder ClubUnsurprising, the Coopers Chase setting is already a very popular filming location If Coopers Chase did exactly what director Chris intended and made old age seem rather appealing to you, we totally get it. The stately home is actually an Elizabethan country estate called Englefield House (the grounds of which include the church where Pippa Middleton got married), which has also featured in The Crown, Masters Of The Air, The King’s Speech and many more film and TV productions.And, if you watched Lena Dunham’s Too Much on Netflix this summer, you’ll have seen Megan Stalter’s character scale the side of the building when she gets locked in the bathroom at a countryside wedding in episode eight.Another important filming location boasts some pretty huge past projectsRon’s aqua-aerobics class sequence was filmed at Gaddesden Place in Hertfordshire, which has been a popular filming location since as early as 1944.A broad range of movies and TV shows have been filmed there over the years, including The Children Act, Holby City and I Hate Suzie.It’s also a popular spot for productions that require scenes set in 10 Downing Street, including The Legend Of Tarzan with Alexander Skarsgård and Samuel L. Jackson, due to the similarity in the entrance halls and drawing room with the cabinet room at the prime minister’s residence.Ron tries out some aqua-aerobics in one memorable scene of The Thursday Murder ClubHowever, many of The Thursday Murder Club’s sets were constructed entirely from scratchSome of the scenes set in London and other various interior shots – including the Coopers Chase apartments and the interior of Fairhaven police station – were brand new set pieces.The iconic Shepperton Studios has hosted countless movie productions over the years – like Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again, Bridget Jones’s Diary and the first Downton Abbey movie – and the Thursday Murder Club production joined that list by using newly constructed sets on Netflix’s stages within the studio.“We were the first to use them,” production designer James Merifield told Time Out. “You could have eaten your dinner off them.”But shooting at these locations wasn’t always as glamorous as it soundsThe Jigsaw Room, where the quartet gather to dive into old crime files, was constructed from new and abutted to the house itself.However, it turns out that shooting with a combination of real and constructed sets brought its fair share of challenges.Many of The Thursday Murder Club's interior scenes were shot on purpose-built setsWhile speaking to Time Out, production designer James opened up about how this was “one of the greatest challenges”.“It’s one thing building a set, but it’s another to integrate it into existing architecture,” he explained.He also revealed that one day the crew had just finished building and dressing the set when “we had this massive storm and it flooded”.James admitted: “Our prop people were pulling out the furniture, and we had to send someone to B&Q to get an AquaVac.”One location in the film adaptation of The Thursday Murder Club was a real departure from the bookIn The Thursday Murder Club novel, much of the story unravels in the fictional seaside town of Fairhaven and around the Kentish Weald, but the movie instead makes London a key location.“They go to the seaside in the book but we made that into a trip into London,” production designer James Merifield told Time Out.He also added that it “just became more practical to shoot around London” than some of the more remote locations featured in the novel. One town has already been transformed thanks to the movie’s successThe real-life village of Aldbury in Hertfordshire proved to be another important filming location, doubling as the fictional town of Fairhaven during July 2024.And after hosting the movie production crew, the village has now even been able to make structural improvements thanks to financial contributions from Netflix.Aldbury Parish Council told the BBC that funds contributed from the production crew have gone towards improving the common, refurbishing a school playground and adding a duck house to the village pond.“We didn’t have a moment’s problem with them,” Ray Warren, vice chair of the authority, said of the filming crew“It’s one of those things where you have to balance the disruption to the village versus the benefit of having that income. “I think generally speaking, most people in the village recognise that having them come in, spend money in the village with us, has been really, really helpful because we’ve ploughed all that back into the village.”Tom Ellis was ‘dreading’ this one sceneIn one particularly memorable scene in the film, Tom Ellis’ character Jason is shown training to compete in Dancing On Ice (and yes, that’s a real plot line in the book!), and Tom confessed during an interview with Digital Spy that he was “dreading” that particular moment. View this post on InstagramA post shared by Digital Spy (@digitalspy)“I had to go for several lessons,” he elaborated, “and I was working with some of the people that actually do Dancing On Ice, and they informed me that normally you do 30 hours of training before you even start doing the recorded bit of training. I had about five, I think”.Not only was he training with the team behind the celebrity skating content, but real-life Dancing On Ice star Vanessa Bauer is Tom’s scene partner in the movie.“Thankfully, with the wonders of smoke and mirrors, [editing] made me look a little bit better than I was,” he added.This Hollywood directing legend visited the set during filmingAs if The Thursday Murder Club movie adaptation wasn’t star-studded enough, the production team was graced with a visit from none other than Hollywood directing legend Steven Spielberg.But this wasn’t just a random act of kindness from the Jaws director. Rather, the production company he co-founded, Amblin Entertainment, is actually behind the screen adaptation. Speaking on his podcast The Rest Is Entertainment, Richard Osman said the director had an “incredible presence” on the day he came to the set.“There’s certain people you meet where you go, ‘Oh my god, you’re Steven Spielberg’,” the former Pointless star said. “It was so lovely seeing even the other actors were excited to be around him.The legendary filmmaker is also good friends with director Chris, with Richard remarking that they “adore each other”, and sharing that Steven Spielberg was “everything that you’d want him to be”.Pierce Brosnan had the same reaction to being cast as Ron as many fans of the booksWhile fans of the book were undoubtedly excited at news of a movie adaptation, there was one piece of casting news that left people with questions.In the months leading up to the film’s release, author Richard spoke out in defence of Pierce Brosnan’s casting as fan-favourite Ron.Ron is described in the novels as a trade unionist with a neck tattoo, with some fans thinking Ray Winstone or Ted Lasso and Coronation Street star Bill Fellows would potentially be a better fit.“Here’s the key thing about Pierce Brosnan playing Ron: Pierce Brosnan is who Ron would choose to play Ron,” Richard insisted to Empire, explaining the meta reasoning behind the decision.And as it turns out, even the James Bond actor himself was a bit puzzled by the decision.“I thought: ‘This is Ray Winstone, bro’,” he told the BBC.“Don’t say anything Pierce,” he recalled telling himself. “Just keep going.”Pierce Brosnan's casting as Ron raised eyebrows among some Thursday Murder Club fansOne costume detail left Daniel Mays rather uncomfortable on setLine Of Duty actor Daniel Mays plays DCI Chris Hudson in the movie, which required him to wear a fat suit for the role.“I felt real ownership of Chris Hudson before I even set foot in rehearsals,” he told Digital Spy.“The key to the character was food, that was a big ‘in’ for me. So that was why we’ve chosen to come up with a padded fat suit, which is quite uncomfortable to wear. But it encapsulates what I wanted to create with the character.”Naomi Ackie and Daniel Mays on the set of The Thursday Murder ClubThere were a few scenes shot for The Thursday Murder Club that didn’t make the final cutAs is the case with almost every movie, there were some scenes and finer details shot for The Thursday Murder Club that didn’t make the final cut.Speaking ahead of the film’s release, as reported by The Express, the director said one of those was a scene in which “Ibrahim actually comes out to Ron”, but “timing” meant it had to be axed.However, he’s expressed his hopes for that to maybe be included in a future sequel.In the meantime, though, one deleted scene is now available to watch courtesy of Netflix. Billed by the director as as a “brilliant” short film, the eight-and-a-half-minute deleted scene is titled The Priest Who Wasn’t A Priest, in which officer De Freitas (Naomi Ackie) sees what secrets local priest Father Mackie (Joseph Marcell) is keeping from the gang.Sir Ben Kingsley as Ibrahim in The Thursday Murder ClubChris Columbus regretted not being able to include one scene in particular in The Thursday Murder ClubOne of the director’s hardest decisions was not being able to show all of Ibrahim’s (Ben Kingsley) flat.Speaking at the British Library ahead of the release, The Mirror reported the filmmaker calling the decision his “biggest regret”.“Ibrahim’s flat was stunning. You could actually move into it, it was that amazing, and we really never get to see enough of it. So that would be the thing I regret the most,” he said.Not every deviation from the book has gone down well with Thursday Murder Club devoteesLike any film adaptation, there are a few departures from the source material in tweaking it for the big screen, but there’s one that hasn’t gone down particularly well with fans of the book. Major spoilers coming here.As is consistent with the book, Bogdan Jankowski (played by Henry Lloyd-Hughes) is the person who murders Tony Curran, but in the movie he’s arrested and sent to prison – something which does not happen in the book. With his character now in prison, that does leave questions about how he will come into potential sequels, since his character continues to appear in the book sequels and even becomes something of an honorary member within the group.And needless to say, fans have been pretty upset about the change…The Thursday Murder Club is available to stream now on Netflix.READ MORE:Thought The Stars Of The Thursday Murder Club Looked Familiar? Here's Where You've Seen Them BeforeWe've Got Good News And Bad News For Anyone Hoping For A Thursday Murder Club SequelThe Thursday Murder Club Has Officially Been Dethroned As Netflix's Most-Watched Film Right Now

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