Decent Stoll Effort
Here is a great Holmes story, well adapted and produced on location--at least, the exteriors look like Cornwall. The staging is good; the acting fine; the action fairly crisp. I hope more of there titles turn up, and I hope someone restores these shorts someday.
Mr Norwood set a high standard for subsequent Holmes interpreters, though it appears William Gillette, who played the part on stage for twenty years, exerted more of an influence. Orson Welles, in an introduction to a radio production, paid high tribute to Gillette; Bosley Crowther, an influential New York theater critic, wrote "I would rather see William Gillette play Sherlock Holmes than to be a child again on Christmas morning." At eighty-three years old, he starred in the very first Holmes radio show, on 20 October 1930.
Probably these two-reel Stoll shorts didn't get much marketing in America--Hollywood productions were going strong by the '20's and maybe there wasn't much interest. But the ones I've seen stand up well.
Enjoyable: historic.
Mr Norwood set a high standard for subsequent Holmes interpreters, though it appears William Gillette, who played the part on stage for twenty years, exerted more of an influence. Orson Welles, in an introduction to a radio production, paid high tribute to Gillette; Bosley Crowther, an influential New York theater critic, wrote "I would rather see William Gillette play Sherlock Holmes than to be a child again on Christmas morning." At eighty-three years old, he starred in the very first Holmes radio show, on 20 October 1930.
Probably these two-reel Stoll shorts didn't get much marketing in America--Hollywood productions were going strong by the '20's and maybe there wasn't much interest. But the ones I've seen stand up well.
Enjoyable: historic.
- jhboswell
- 29. März 2014