BBC One Planning Remake of The Lady Vanishes

BBC One is planning a remake of Alfred Hitchcock's classic thriller from 1938, The Lady Vanishes. The 90-minute made-for-television movie stars Tuppence Middleton as wealthy, young socialite Iris Carr, who is comforted by Miss Froy after fainting on a train platform, before waking up to discover her good Samaritan has vanished.

Screenwriter Fiona Seres has adapted the script from the original source material, the 1936 novel The Wheel Spins by Ethel White, which also served as the basis for Hitchcock's film. According to BBC News, filming is expected to begin later this month in Budapest.

"Fiona's adaptation of The Wheel Spins deftly weaves together the intriguing stories of a psychologically complex group of characters … played out against the tense backdrop of the Balkans in the 1930s," said BBC Drama's Kate Harwood.

The Lady Vanishes is scheduled to air this Christmas.

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The Wheel Spins
Ethel White

The protagonist of the story is Iris Carr, who suffers a blackout just before boarding a train that is traveling across Europe to London. On board the train, the still-woozy Iris befriends a certain Mrs. Froy, a fellow Englishwoman who is perhaps a bit eccentric but seems to be for the most part agreeable and benign. Mrs. Froy is the "vanishing lady" of Hitchcock's title, and it is Mrs. Froy who mysteriously disappears while Iris is napping. Her inexplicable departure throws Iris into a mind-bending mystery that will make her alternately question her sanity and the designs of the people around her. When Iris asks about Mrs. Froy, everyone on board the train denies ever having seen the old woman. Although Iris could perhaps be swayed due to the knock on her head that Mrs. Froy was merely a vivid hallucination, a few stray details suggest that something more sinister is happening, and Iris resolves to get to the bottom of the mystery.