I first came across the recordings when the music director of my own show, Sherlock Holmes: The Musical, gave them to me as a birthday present. I began listening to them in my cabin at Byrdcliffe Arts Colony in Woodstock, New York, and I was soon hooked. (Our rustic cabins have no television reception, and so radio or tapes are the only source of electronic stimulation.)
For two glorious weeks, I never once missed my cable TV or my usual fix of Forensic Files. I had all the crime solving I needed—and in the much more intimate, personal medium of radio! Here were Holmes and Watson, together again, in the old familiar settings, sweeping out into the swirling London fog, their overcoats drawn tightly around them, in search of a Hansom cab, on the heels of the nefarious criminals lurking in London’s seedy underworld.
After gorging myself on the sixteen-episode set my friend had given me, I was delighted to see two more CDs awaiting me in the mail upon my return to New York City: The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, yet another Jim French production.
The first thing you notice about the recordings is how rich and well-done the production values are. The opening theme is Camille Saint-Saens’s Dance Macabre—which, with its sliding, spooky opening violin solo of dissonant tritones, sets the mood perfectly (coincidentally, the same music is also the theme of the BBC’s mystery series Jonathan Creek). The incidental music in the French series, by Michael Lynch, is excellent, and serves to highlight the action and drama of the stories.
I was disappointed to see that the excellent John Gilbert had been replaced by John Patrick Lowrie as Sherlock Holmes in The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, but I need not have worried. Lowrie is a wonderful Holmes, and—whether by accident or design—he sounds uncannily like Basil Rathbone. Lawrence Albert is a sensible, stalwart Watson; and many of the guest character actors (including Dennis Bateman, Ellen McLain, and Rick May as Inspector Lestrade) are delightful, ranging from drunken night watchmen to prissy upper class clients.
The actors’ English accents are not all uniformly convincing, but it is a minor point, and it would be churlish to point out which performers could use some work in the dialect department. More importantly, the spirit of the original is preserved in the carefully crafted stories and beautifully recreated scenes, often set in aurally interesting locations such as cavernous museums and London alleyways.
The first-person narrative by Dr. Watson, as in the original stories, is effective but never intrusive—most of the action is advanced through scene, action, and dialogue; and most of the stories contain very Doyle-like plot twists. Most of the time the live audiences are not apparent in the recordings, though in one amusing scene in which Holmes gives Mrs. Hudson (the delightful Lee Paasch) an impromptu acting lesson, you can hear giggles from the audience.
The plots are clever and engaging—especially impressive when one considers that each story runs less than thirty minutes. Jim French has been writing radio dramas for over thirty years, which is not surprising, given the quality of the Holmes mysteries. His company is called Imagination Theatre. Visit their website, HTTP://WWW.JIMFRENCHPRODUCTIONS.COM/, and they will tell you that it is “American radio’s premiere drama series, now heard coast to coast on well over a hundred radio stations in North America and by satellite on XM Radio.”
Out of Seattle, their weekly broadcasts “feature mystery, suspense, fantasy and adventure, produced by Jim French Productions before live audiences on a state-of-the-art recording stage.”
The Holmes stories that French has written were authorized by the estate of Dame Jean Conan Doyle, and a BBC host called the show, “One of the four best radio dramas in the English language.” To bring them to life, the website tells us, French studied the master’s original stories and delved into Victorian history. A visit to the website also offers glimpses of other intriguing mysteries and dramas available from Imagination Theatre: in addition to the Sherlock Holmes stories, there are the adventures of “a former Chicago cop turned hard-luck private detective named Harry Nile.” French created the character thirty years ago for a one-time-only broadcast, but audience response was enthusiastic, “and so began 26 years of episodes featuring Phil Harper as Harry, later to be joined by Pat French as his admiring and quirky associate, Murphy. Harry Nile has developed a large, devoted following, maybe because he’s had a hard life—kicked off the Chicago police force, hounded by a dirty cop who was on the take, battling his own gambling addiction, even losing his bride of one year in a gun battle.”
Also available on audio tape or CD are other tales of Raffles, which are “based on stories written by E.W. Hornung, the brother-in-law of Holmes’s creator Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.” Raffles is “that fabulous rogue of Victorian society A.J. Raffles” (played by actor John Armstrong). Some of the stories available are “The Ides of March,” “A Costume Piece,” and a completely original play by M. J. Elliott “A Gift From the Gods.”
There are other delights to be found as well, such as Act One Audio from Topics Entertainment, a collection from the Movies for Your Mind series of Jim French mysteries, suspense dramas, Sci-Fi, and fantasy radio shows which first aired over KVI in Seattle in a series called Crisis.
So brew yourself a cup of tea (or indulge in something stronger—say, a decent glass of Port), put your feet up, fire up the CD player, and settle in to enjoy a jolly good adventure, courtesy of Jim French and friends!
THE ADVENTURE OF THE HANOVERIAN VAMPIRES, by Darrell Schweitzer
I found it. It was mine, a pretty, shiny thing, which I found amusing to swat about on the ground for several minutes, watching the evening sunlight gleam off the polished surface. Then, of course, I lost interest and left it where it lay. But it was still mine. So when one of the “street arabs”—verminous boys—snatched it up, I yowled in protest and gave the villain a fine raking on the calf.
He yowled right back and kicked me away. I landed nimbly and hissed, ready for another round of combat.
“What have you got there, Billy?” came another voice.
“I dunno, Mr. ’Olmes.”
“I’ll give you a shilling for it.”
The transaction was done, though the shiny object was still mine.
But now I was content, for the trouser leg I rubbed against belonged to the most perceptive of all human beings, the Great Detective himself, and the result of that encounter is the only Sherlock Holmes adventure ever narrated by a cat.
It is not possible for me to give you my name, for the true names of cats are never revealed outside our secretive tribe, and not even Sherlock Holmes may deduce them; whether the street arabs or Dr. Watson called me Fluffy or Mouser or something far less complimentary is, frankly, beneath notice. Suffice it to say that Holmes and I had a certain understanding by which we recognized and respected one another. You won’t read of any of this in the chronicles penned by the doltish Watson, an altogether inferior lump of clay, who once owned a bulldog pup, probably without appreciating the crucial distinction that one owns a dog but entertains a cat. A dog is a useful object, even as, I suppose, Watson at times was useful.
But he tried to shoo me away, hissing, “Scat!” and other ridiculous imprecations, before Holmes drew his attention to the object in hand.
“It is the clue we have been seeking,” said he. “Come Watson, we have much to do this night. It would be well if you brought your revolver.”
* * * *
Moments later, all three of us were clattering along the rapidly darkening streets of London in a Hansom. At first the driver, like the boorish Watson, objected to my presence, but
