PoemIn an obvious attempt to be more ethnically sensitive, The Adventure Company has used an entirely new name for the 10 guests. Printed as an over-sheet and attached on the right inside cover is a poem (see Advertising Blurbs for a transcription). In the poem, the main characters are called Ten Little Sailor Boys. In the novel the poem was (depending on the release) Ten Little Niggers or Ten Little Indians
Source AdaptionsBook Description:
Ten people, each with something to hide and something to fear, are invited to a lonely mansion on Indian Island by a host who, surprisingly, fails to appear. On the island they are cut off from everything but each other and the inescapable shadows of their own past lives. One by one, the guests share the darkest secrets of their wicked pasts. And one by one, they start to die...
- 1939, London: Original title 'Ten Little Niggers' by William Collins Sons & Co.
- 1940, New York: Title changed to 'And Then There Were None' by Dodd, Mead & Co.
- Adapted with a more romantic ending in 1943 by Agatha Christie. It opened in London at St. James Theatre November 17, 1943 titled 'Ten Little Niggers' and as 'Ten Little Indians' in the US at Broadhurst Theatre in New York City on June 27, 1944.
- 'And Then There Were None', 1945 was the first feature film version and produced in the US by Twentieth Century Fox.
- The second, 'Ten Little Indians', 1965, was by Seven Arts Films in England with the setting moved to a remote mountain top castle in the Austrian Alps.
- The third film, 'Ten Little Indians', 1975, was produced by Avco-Embassy, Inc. with the setting in a remote hotel in the Iranian desert.
- The fourth, again titled 'Ten Little Indians', 1989, was produced by Breton Films who moved the locale to an African safari.
The film adaptations all retained the ending of the play, rather than the original of the novel.
TV: BBC produced a TV version of the stage adaptation, which aired as a live drama on August 20, 1949 as 'Ten Little Niggers'.