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On the stage of the Athenaeum Theatre a play is being staged. It is a story based on the life of London's greatest detective, Sherlock Holmes. Suddenly the action is interrupted when a body tumbles out from behind a piece of fallen scenery. A doctor is called for but it is too late, the female victim is dead. The next day Dr Watson, who penned the play, calls upon his old friend, the real Sherlock Holmes. Holmes has become a cocaine addict, bad tempered and wallowing in self-loathing, no longer finding any purpose in life. Suddenly Holmes receives a second visitor, a mysterious veiled woman who claims to be the sister of the murder victim, imploring Holmes to find her siblings killer, the seemingly supernatural 'Athenaeum ghoul'. Although he seems disinterested at first, for Holmes it is a new beginning, revitalised he throws himself into the investigation. Thus the adventure begins, taking us from Holmes' Baker Street apartment to a house and garden on Hampstead Heath, a Turkish bathhouse, and the backstage area of the Athenaeum theatre where the murder took place. Here, Holmes reveals the all the clues and unmasks the all too human killer.
I found this to be a patchwork quilt of a play containing a strange mix of serious drama, comedy and near farce. Some of the comedy moments fell flat whilst others were genuinely funny, particularly Watson's discomfiture confronted by a woman in the Turkish Bathhouse. As for the mystery, with the action centered around only six primary characters three of whom are the investigating team, it does not require a sleuth of Holme's calibre to guess whom the guilty party would turn out to be long before the final reveal. When Holmes starts to unravel the web of clues at the end it only confirms what we already knew and helps to explain the motive.
Jonathan Keeble gives us a Holmes far removed from the classic Basil Rathbone, Jeremy Brett representation. This Holmes is very much the world-weary misanthrope; sardonic, cynical, even darkly narcissistic. In an otherwise flawless performance he fluffed one line; "So you think Scotland Yard more gullible..", retake "So you think me more gullible than Scotland Yard". Luke Shaw's Watson is perhaps a little slow on the uptake but not the bumbling fool of many representations, and Shaw plays him with tremendous conviction. Keith Drinkel is larger than life as the self-important actor Harry Bell and Angel McGowan is excellent as his pained former actress wife Elena. This couple have more skeletons in their cupboard than the local crypt. But special acting credits go to the two youngest cast members. Jack Blumenau gives a touching performance as Holmes troubled and ill-starred Page and homosexual lover Billy, whilst Abby Leamon looks suitably victorian as Elena Bell's innocent young maid Violet, and also demonstrates a fine singing voice.
A well crafted but ultimately rather predictable story.