See what they drink in See How They Run
Find your new favorite drink while exploring the scene of 1950s London with a troupe of murder mystery thespians, Inspector Stoppard, and Constable Stalker in the latest film for Agatha Christie fans: See How They Run on HBOmax.
Leo Kopernick introduction
We see our narrator for the first time, Leo Kopernick, played by Adrien Brody at the after-party drinking a light gold liquid from a gold-rimmed coupe glass.
Similar looking to a martini glass with a more rounded half-spherical bowl, coupe glasses are used to serve any drink that's shaken or stirred ("up and over" cocktails), strained into a chilled glass, and served without ice.
Mervyn Cocker-Norris introduction
The waiter played by Oliver Jackson, whose name we later find out is Trumpet, serves Mervyn Cocker-Norris played by David Oyelowo the familiar clear drink in a gold-rimmed coupe glass.
A passing guest
A passing lady party guest steps briefly through the frame with a more golden colored cocktail in a gold-rimmed martini glass.
A slightly darker martini like this is often a golden martini, which usually calls for double the olive brine as a dirty martini.
Here's a little martini recipe framework for you to play with:
- Traditional martini
1/2oz (1 part) dry vermouth, 3oz (6 parts) gin or vodka (and I want no part of the gin vs. vodka debate!..but I'm team gin) - Dirty martini
Trade 1/2 oz (1 part) of the gin for 1/2 oz of olive brine. Serve with an olive.
Simply put: 1/2 oz dry vermouth, 1/2 oz olive brine, 2.5 oz gin - Golden martini
Trade another 1/2 oz (1 part) of gin for an additional 1/2 oz (1 part) olive brine.
Simply put: 1/2 oz dry vermouth, 1oz olive brine, 2 oz gin
Mervyn's tempermental Neapolitan
Mervyn’s parter, who he later calls his nephew (as a cover, we presume), approaches holding two gold-rimmed martini glasses with a clear liquid, possibly a traditional martini as described previously, or a clean martini – ½ oz dry vermouth, 2 ½ oz gin and a dash of orange bitters. As he disapprovingly spouts something off in Italian about Mervyn’s interaction with the waiter, Mervyn tells him that he often does overdo the temperamental neapolitan.
Leo asks for motor oil
Evidently more than a social drinker, Leo Kopernick guzzles a clear drink from another gold-rimmed coupe glass and sets it on the server's silver tray. Leo tells the server, whose name we later find out is Trumpet, to “scare me up a real drink, like a pint of rye or bourbon, or motor oil if you have to.”
Trumpet brings Leo a bottle of whiskey with a gold-rimmed double old-fashioned glass, and is told to "keep the change, and the glass."
John Woolf introduction
John Woolf played by Reece Shearsmith walks through the frame toward Mervyn while holding the same gold-rimmed coupe glass with a clear cocktail.
Cranberry cocktail
As Woolf pressures Mervyn about the movie production deadline, we see a man in the background with a gold-rimmed highball glass containing a red drink, possibly a cranberry cocktail.
Impress your friends with a couple of cranberry cocktail recipes at your next mixer:
- Vodka cranberry
1 oz (2 parts) vodka to 3 oz (6 parts) vodka. Brighten up with a squeeze of citrus (lime, lemon, orange) and garnish with a wedge of your chosen citrus and a stirrer. - Blizzard cocktail
2 oz (4 parts) bourbon, 1 ½ oz (3 parts) cranberry juice, ½ (1 part), 1 oz lemon juice, 1 o simple syrup. Serve on ice garnished with a lemon wedge.
Note that this is a stronger cocktail, so adjust the bourbon:cranberry juice ratios as needed to avoid sloshing your guests too quickly.
Dickie Attenborough's toast
Dickie Attenborough played by Harris Dickinson offers a toast holding the staple clear cocktail in a gold-rimmed coupe glass, while his lady standing next to him, Sheila Sim played by Pearl Chanda, has what appears to be the same slightly darker cocktail that Leo Kopernick was holding first at the party.
A whiskey cocktail
A man in the background toasting along holds a gold-rimmed double old-fashioned glass, with what appears to be a whiskey cocktail, or just neat whiskey.
Here's a recipe for an old-fashioned, my personal favorite:
- The basics
3 dashes of bitters on 1 tsp sugar, muttle with ½ tsp water, add 2 oz bourbon. Serve on ice and garnish with a cherry. - A twist
Optionally garnish with an orange peel, and instead of sugar and water or a simple syrup, use ½ oz of the cherry syrup. Yes, the quality of your cherries makes a difference!
Leo and Dickie fight
Leo Kopernick sets down a bottle of whiskey (more on this later) as Richard Attenborough is taking off his jacket to to brawl due to Leo having just made a pass at his lady, Sheila.
Kopernick's hotel room
Stoppard and Stalker enter Leo’s room at The Savoy to find a mess of bottles and drinks on the coffee table.
Panning around to see the desk littered with even more bottles and glasses, amoung them some gold-rimmed white wine glasses, a whiskey decanter, and possibly a port wine and champagne bottles.
At Mervyn's apartment
After the hotel manager tells Stalker and Stoppard about Leo and Mervyn’s fight ending with Mervyn telling Leo, “I’ll kill you for this, Kopernick, you bastard” (ruining his script), the investigators head off to interview Mervyn about the ordeal.
Nettle tea
While Mervyn describes his disdain for flashbacks (within a flashback), he serves Stalker and Stoppard nettle tea in a textured green ceramic tea set. The most similar tea set I could find is this blue altared glaze ceramic tea set, or even similar in style with its short spout and thick walls to a Yixing clay teapot.
Decanter set with glasses
We see a decanter set with glasses in the background. This looks like the same one used earlier in Leo's Savoy Hotel room scene.
Stoppard's dentist appointment
Having tried to escape Stalker’s relentlessness by telling her that he has a dentist appointment, Stalker finds Stoppard at the Coach & Horses pub having a gin. He says he was only there to get rid of the taste of the mouthwash, and tries to reason that the gin is an antiseptic.
Leo hints at extorting Woolf
Leo finds Woolf in the back corner of a bar being intimate with his assistant/mistress, Ann.
A martini and a mystery drink
Woolf's martini is difficult to spot behind Ann's stemmed liquor glass, and it's difficult to see if the martini has an olive or cherry skewer. Having covered the clean and dirty martinis earlier, we'll go with cherries.
- Cherry martini
1.5 oz (3 parts) vodka, 0.5 oz (1 part) cherry brandy, 1.5 oz (3 parts) cherry juice. Add a splash of lemon juice and garnish with a cherry. - Cherry smash
1.5 oz (3 parts) cognac, 1 oz (2 parts) orange liqueur, 0.75 oz (1.5 parts) fresh lemon juice, 3 cherries muddled in 0.5 oz (1 part) cherry syrup (or simple syrup). Serve over ice and garnish with a cherry and orange peel (optional).
Stoppard winds down
After a long day, Stoppard winds down by making a puzzle with his foot-powered band saw and a glass of gin out of a 5oz lowball (aka old fashioned) glass. The flat clear bottle of gin looks like it may be Ryan Reynold’s brand: Aviator.
Grayson Old Rye
We finally see the whiskey mentioned at 6:10, which Trumpet refers to as scotch at 43:55: Grayson Old Rye Whiskey. Interestingly, Grayson Whiskey happens to be neither a scotch nor a rye, but a bourbon.
Being served in London, it’s also notable that the bottle reads “Bottled In Bond,” which means it’s been aged and bottled accordion legal regulations of the American Bottled-in-Bond Act of 1897.
Stoppard and Stalker have a night cap
Stoppard and Stalker share theories over drinks at The Kings Arms. Constable Stalker has a darker beer, maybe a porter, and Inspector Stoppard switches hands between a glass of whiskey (dark enough to presume is bourbon) and a golden ale. Both of their beers are served in dimple stein beer mugs, which hang over the bar.
Stalker's new theory
Constable Stalker has suspicions that the woman Mervyn described as a homely brunette girl wearing thick framed glasses, mother to Leo’s illegitimate child, might be Inspector Stoppard’s ex-wife. During their bonding time the night before, he’d revealed that his wife was 8 months pregnant when she told him that the child she was carrying wasn’t his.
Stalker slides a cup of tea and a tin of biscuits across the table to an unnamed Officer #130 to get more information about Stoppard’s assignment on the case.
Leo serves Stoppard
Stalker chases Stoppard out of the theater and hits him over the head with a shovel. In a dream-state, Stoppard walks through a snowy wooded area to the bar from the opening after-show party where Leo Kopernick serves him a shaken gin drink in a gold-rimed double old-fashioned glass.
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See How They Run
In the West End of 1950s London, plans for a movie version of a smash-hit play come to an abrupt halt after a pivotal member of the crew is murdered. When world-weary Inspector Stoppard and eager rookie Constable Stalker take on the case, the two find themselves thrown into a puzzling whodunit within the glamorously...
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