‘A perfect county'

As Sir Kenneth Branagh returns to the big screen this month playing Agatha Christie’s Poirot, he shares why he loves living in Surrey

- Bernard Bale

This October Sir Kenneth Branagh returns as the mysterious detective, Hercule Poirot, in Death on the Nile, the follow up to the 2017 blockbuster adaptation of Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express, in which he also starred and directed.

But away from the sun, sand and heat of Egypt, Sir Kenneth likes to spend his downtime in the countryside right here is Surrey, where he has a home near Chobham.

“It is a perfect county for someone in my profession,” he says. “It is close to London, close to the major film studios but has such a beautiful countryside that you really can get away from it all and pretend you are miles from anywhere.

“There are some country pubs and restaurants – as good as any you might find in London – and I have friends nearby too so when I come home to be away from my work, I cannot think of a better place.”

Living in Surrey is a far cry from the Northern Irish city where Kenneth was born (on December 10, 1960) to his plumber/carpenter father, William; mother, Frances; and siblings, William Jnr and Joyce.

“Growing up in Belfast there was, believe it or not a great sense of family and community,” he remembers. “I actually felt secure there. Life was built around visiting people you knew. I remember years of coming home from school and going to my Auntie Irene’s, who lived two doors down, before my mother came home from work. My granny gave me my lunch from school every single day when I was at the Grove Primary School.”