Miss Fisher movie premieres

Feature film adaptation Miss Fisher & the Crypt of Tears held its Victorian premiere last night at the Sun Theatre in Yarraville before an audience all dressed in period costume.

In attendance were stars Essie Davis, Nathan Page, author Kerry Greenwood and producers Fiona Eagger and Deb Cox.

Previous screenings were held at Palm Springs USA and Hayden Orpheum in Sydney.

Filmed on location in Melbourne, Australia, and in Morocco, Essie Davis returns in the eponymous lead role as the glamorous private detective, The Honourable Miss Phryne Fisher, whose exploits in 1920s Melbourne, Australia, lead her to murder, mystery and mayhem from London to British Palestine.

Private investors and fans contributed more than $AUS1 million to the budget for Miss Fisher & The Crypt of Tears through an extraordinarily successful crowd funding campaign.

The film is produced by Fiona Eagger, with Every Cloud’s Eagger and Cox also acting as executive producers. Lucy Maclaren is co-producer.

It opens in cinemas on Thursday.

The film opens with the Hon. Miss Phryne Fisher rescuing Shirin Abbas, a young Bedouin woman, who has been thrown into jail in British Mandated Palestine, for making trouble at a time of colonial unrest. After a perilous escape from Jerusalem, she rejoins Shirin as a fellow guest in the home of Lord and Lady Lofthouse, for the London ‘season’ and she pledges to help her right a wrong and discover the truth about the Crypt of Tears – an ancient crypt rumoured to lie somewhere beneath the rolling sands of the Negev Desert.

Essie is joined by her co-stars from the series including Nathan Page as Detective Inspector Jack Robinson, Miriam Margolyes as Aunt Prudence and Ashleigh Cummings as her loyal companion Dorothy ‘Dot’ Collins. The international cast includes Britain’s Rupert Penry-Jones (Vita & Virginia, Spooks, Black Sails), Egyptian star Kal Naga (Vikings, The Last Post) and, returning to Australia, Daniel Lapaine (Muriel’s Wedding, Upright, Zero Dark City).

From a screenplay by Deb Cox, Miss Fisher & The Crypt of Tears is directed by Tony Tilse. who was the set-up director on the television series Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries. Tony has built a formidable international reputation for work such as Serangoon Road and Grace (HBO Asia), Wolf Creek, multiple episodes of Ash vs Evil Dead for producer Sam Raimi and Chosen for Playmaker / China’s iQiyi.

Photos: Instagram