British Comedy Guide
Jonathan Creek. Jonathan Creek (Alan Davies). Copyright: BBC
Jonathan Creek

Jonathan Creek

  • TV comedy drama
  • BBC One
  • 1997 - 2016
  • 32 episodes (5 series)

Comedy drama following a creator of magical illusions who finds his expertise suited to solving murders and mysteries. Stars Alan Davies, Caroline Quentin, Stuart Milligan, Julia Sawalha, Adrian Edmondson and more.

  • Series 3, Episode 4 repeated Tuesday 31st December at 8pm on U&Drama
  • JustWatch Streaming rank this week: 451

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The Clue Of The Savant's Thumb

Jonathan and Joey are drawn into a complex case involving a secret society, seemingly supernatural events at a girls' boarding school, and the miraculous disappearance of a body in front of three witnesses.

Preview clips

Further details

Jonathan Creek. Image shows from L to R: Joey Ross (Sheridan Smith), Jonathan Creek (Alan Davies), D.I. Gideon Pryke (Rik Mayall), Rosalind Tartikoff (Joanna Lumley). Copyright: BBC

When a dead body impossibly vanishes from a locked study it is only the first in a chain of dark mysteries confronting Jonathan Creek and self-styled paranormal investigator Joey Ross.

Writer, producer, political campaigner and all round polymath Franklin Tartikoff is one of the country's most eminent intellectuals. But tragedy and horror are about to engulf the vast old country house he shares with his beautiful wife Rosalind, and their adopted daughter Fariba.

On the day that Fariba returns from a spiritual journey to the remote Far Eastern island where she was born her mother is attending the funeral of an old school friend... an event that will unleash disturbing memories of a classmate whose macabre death, 50 years ago in the school dormitory, was never explained.

Today, Waxwood Hall convent school lies eerily empty and derelict. But as Rosalind Tartikoff revisits her childhood haunts she finds that ghosts from the past still stalk its gloomy interior. Now a lecturer in Humanities and Modern Philosophy, and an avowed religious sceptic, how can she bear to admit - even to herself - that as a rebellious teenager in the Sixties she once had a miraculous vision of God?

And when her life is ripped apart by the shocking death of her husband, and a disappearing act that appears to defy the laws of science - the very fabric of everything she believes in - there is only one person she feels she can turn to... who, in a world of "gods and spirits and magic and miracles can still fly the flag for common sense".

A grisly murder, the macabre history of a Catholic girls' school, a sinister local society and a series of increasingly puzzling, interlocking clues form the backdrop to another weird and wonderful case for Creek and Joey - where this time they find themselves merely junior players, in an inquiry spearheaded by the flamboyant and indomitable detective inspector, Gideon Pryke.

An inquiry whose resolution will prove infinitely deeper and darker than any of them could have imagined...

Jonathan Creek. Image shows from L to R: Jonathan Creek (Alan Davies), Joey Ross (Sheridan Smith). Copyright: BBC
Jonathan Creek. Image shows from L to R: Jonathan Creek (Alan Davies), Joey Ross (Sheridan Smith), D.I. Gideon Pryke (Rik Mayall). Copyright: BBC
Jonathan Creek. Image shows from L to R: Joey Ross (Sheridan Smith), D.I. Gideon Pryke (Rik Mayall), Jonathan Creek (Alan Davies), Rosalind Tartikoff (Joanna Lumley). Copyright: BBC

Notes

This episode was subject to a last minute rescheduling from an originally planned and listed transmission time of 8:30pm.

Broadcast details

Date
Monday 1st April 2013
Time
9pm
Channel
BBC One
Length
90 minutes

Cast & crew

Cast
Alan Davies Jonathan Creek
Sarah Alexander Polly Creek
Guest cast
Rik Mayall D.I. Gideon Pryke
Sheridan Smith Joey Ross
Joanna Lumley Rosalind Tartikoff
Nigel Planer Franklin Tartikoff
Hasina Haque Fariba Tartikoff
Mark Frost Brad
Michael Lumsden Peter Churchill
Anna Burnett Young Rosalind
Phoebe Jones Natalie
Lucie Wolfman Grace
Lydia Gerrard Young Beth
Angelica Jopling Kate
Mairead Conneely Sister Cunegonde
Abigail McKern Beth
Robert Styles Jack
Louise Yates Davina
Samantha Coughlan Receptionist
Sharlene Whyte WDC Atkins
James Buller DS Cudlipp
David Renwick TV Host
Writing team
David Renwick Writer
Production team
David Renwick Director
Rosemary McGowan Producer
Pete Thornton Executive Producer
William Webb Editor
John Asbridge Production Designer
Rick Wentworth Composer

Videos

Who's Brad?

Joey thinks she has a lead for Jonathan, so she takes him to a farm to talk to Brad...

Featuring: Alan Davies (Jonathan Creek) & Sheridan Smith (Joey Ross).

A Call for Jonathan Creek

When a corpse impossibly vanishes from a locked study, it is only the first in a chain of dark mysteries confronting Jonathan Creek.

Featuring: Alan Davies (Jonathan Creek) & Joanna Lumley (Rosalind Tartikoff).

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