The Golden Spiders: A Nero Wolfe Mystery

Nice try to put on screen books of my favorite author. It looks like director loves them too. Of course, events go too fast - the books are pretty thick, and the time for the TV series is strictly limited, nevertheless scenery is the good work too. Maybe characters are not quite as I think of them - Wolfe should be bigger (handsomer :)), and Archie should be a little more attractive, and Fritz little younger. Saul+Fred+Orrie are good, and Cremer is perfect. But it's the best effort of putting the books on screen I've seen. It's made with love and application.

Whatever else might be said about the overall entertainment value of this production, Rex Stout would not be disappointed by the production decisions or the casting of this nicely drawn adaptation.

The movie is brimming with gorgeous period details, handsome Studebakers and drab office waiting rooms. The physical characteristics of Wolfe's entire world in a brownstone appear here to be spot on, as though the producers were preparing it for the famously particular sleuth himself. Maury Chaykin brings to his character the thought, care, and gravitas worthy of a King Lear, and manages to present a Nero Wolfe at once psychically wounded, showcat-finicky, masculine, compulsive about his orderly routine, insightful in the workings of others, and a little bit clueless about himself. Although the violence of his angry outbursts seems a little overmodulated, a better choice for the role is hard to imagine.

Archie Goodwin is a less boldly written role, but in this production he seems fully realized and very natural. Timothy Hutton gets the right tone when Archie is dealing with his exacting boss, and it doesn't seem at all odd that this smart aleck would be loyal to a man who routinely tells him where to sit. (The entire snoop team's devotion to Wolfe is palpable, felt not so much in what's said as in what need not be said. All this seems like a minor miracle in a TV movie.) Archie seems very much to enjoy manipulating the hapless participants in the mystery, as though escorting guests out the door before they are ready is wicked fun. (Only Bruce Willis -circa 1988- comes to mind as closer to the ideal Archie - you really don't want to see Tim Hutton's Archie take a punch.)

The plot's something of a tangle, and women characters don't get a chance to shine, but these shortcomings go straight back to Rex Stout. The joys of this story are in the unique and symbiotic relationship of Nero Wolfe and Archie, and in the mystery of a detective whose gifts of insight stop just short of the bathroom mirror.

For you Rex Stout readers, I needn't tell you that many fans consider The Golden Spiders to be a classic in the Nero Wolfe canon. I consider this, and the series that spun from it, to be solid adaptations of the novels.

As for the user comment prominently featured on the main page:

I see you've never read any of the Nero Wolfe mysteries. As a diehard fan of Rex Stout's portly detective, I can fill you in a little.

Archie Goodwin is indeed the protagonist of all the mysteries, he's the central character, the mysteries are told from his viewpoint. That they are called "Nero Wolfe Mysteries" is not a true incongruency that ought to offend a reader, or a viewer of this film or the subsequent series.

It's my opinion that both this movie, and the series that spun off from it, do Stout's novels justice as well as any video adaptation might. Archie gives the city of New York some flavor and style, and perfectly captures the essence of the 40's and 50's in that city, while somehow simultaneously making the portrayal timeless (the Wolfe novels began in '34 and were written well into the 60's.)

Wolfe is not meant to be *anything* like Sherlock Holmes. Wolfe is irrascible, eccentric, has a very short temper and little tolerance for stupidity, and his relationship with Archie is completely different from that of Holmes to Watson. That Wolfe is in his plant rooms with the orchids from 9-11 and 2-4 without fail (excepting Sundays), never leaves his beloved brownstone residence on West 35th street, and continually bickers with his chef Fritz about every recipe brought into the house, well that's the sort of thing that builds interesting characters. For my taste, Holmes is a dry and uninteresting character, for what it's worth. Wolfe has his flaws, and his share of little perculiar mannerisms, enough to make him interesting.

As for the obligatory scene, where the detective assembles everyone concerned into his office and solves the mystery, well....sure it's not realistic, but it's FUN. At least, for mystery readers it is. Since Wolfe (almost) never leaves his house, and it tickles his enormous vanity to set up such a scene, and Inspector Cramer knows Wolfe can deliver the goods in such a situation, they arrange for one.

I leave this comment so that future mystery novel enthusiasts, and fans of Rex Stout, will know that this film, the subsequent full-length feature (The Doorbell Rang), and the series is indeed quality material worth checking out.

Before anything else, I'd like to know why this episode is separated from the other 22 episodes. Since five of the novels were divided in two, the official list is 27 episodes. I have this as the pilot, based upon date released, followed by two seasons of novels and novellas. There were two main cast character change from this episode to the remaining 22. Nero Wolfe, Archie Goodwin, Fritz Brenner, Inspector Cramer, Purley Stebbins, Fred Durkin, Orrie Cather, and Lily Rowan remain the same throughout. The changes were the actors who played Lon Cohen and Saul Panzer. The rest of the cast was done as an ensemble.

Having read each of Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe stories multiple times before this television series appeared, I was curious how faithful to the written word it would be. I was very pleased with the result. My only complaint is not the production values, but that now I'm losing my hearing, they did not think to supply subtitles. The Golden Spiders had everything to warrant a full series, but it was not to the taste of everyone, as there have been various complaints about one actor or another, too much bombast, earlier series (that frankly left me cold) being better, but for me...I was tickled pink that each episode brought forth the essence of that particular story.

The Golden Spiders made me hope for more.

Nero Wolfe has consistently defied a good translation to the screen, perhaps because so much of the attraction in Rex Stout's novels is the wit of the language. But this is the best job so far. Best casting is Timothy Hutton as Archie Goodwin, who succeeds in combining the smart alec and hardboiled just like the character in the book. Chaykin makes a good effort as Wolfe; he isn't really BIG enough, so that his high-pitched tirades don't really do justice to Wolfe's bellowing. Wolfe's office is just as you could imagine it, down to the red leather chair. The orchid room, by contrast, is disappointing--need more flowers, more jungle. Not sure why Golden Spiders was chosen as plot--there are perhaps too many characters and the suspects aren't developed enough. Hopefully, this will be the first in a series of films.