Miss Marple (TV series) In addition to Miss Marple, there are two semi-regular characters in the series. The first is Inspector (later Superintendent) Slack, played by David Horovitch; the second is Constable (later Sergeant) Lake, played by Ian Brimble. Slack and Lake appear in five episodes: "The Body in the Library", "The Murder at the Vicarage", "4.50 From Paddington", "They Do It with Mirrors" and "The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side". They are the official detectives and both (particularly Slack) originally dislike and are exasperated by Miss Marple, her interference and her methods, but they eventually come to respect (and indeed, in the
Miss Marple (TV series) stories including "The Secret Adversary" and in the subsequent series "Agatha Christie's Partners in Crime". With the success of that series, the BBC received approval to produce the stories of one of Christie's most famous detectives. At the time the BBC was granted the screen rights to all 12 Marple novels, the rights to three already co-existed. "The Mirror Crack'd From Side to Side" had already been filmed and theatrically released in 1980 with Angela Lansbury in the role, and the same production company was in the process of filming "A Caribbean Mystery" and "They Do It With Mirrors" with