Word: ouida
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Dates: during 1953-1953
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Sherlock Holmes brought Basil Rathbone to Broadway in a role he has played countless times in movies and on radio. The play was not William Gillette's famous old warhorse. but a new and curious one by Ouida (Mrs. Basil) Rathbone. However it might strike Baker Street Irregulars, for Baker Street occasionals it had none of the thrills of detective drama, only the feeblest period charm, and mere hints of Holmes's personal glamour. A dull clutter of styles and stories, it closed after three performances...
...accompanies Wolcott Gibbs when he lightly pans a play. Simply the usual "polishing and tightening" which a Boston tryout promiscs will not prevent a waste of considerable talent, talent scarcely evident in the ragged performance on Monday night. With Basil Rathbone cast in his famous role, a script by Ouida Rathbone based faithfully though eclectically on five of Conan Doyle's best stories, and the rather curious but impressive attraction of Jarmila Novotna in the cast, it is hard to believe that the producers can't eventually come up with something better than they have...
...Rathbone to study his part and play Holmes rather than a House Dick, they can cure the major ill of the play. To make Sherlock Holmes effective, however, they must dispense with the flashbacks, the muddled staging, and the exaggerations of acting in the minor roles. In the meantime, Ouida must straighten out the story line, which now leaves justice inexplicably triumphant in the last act. Certainly the present state of Sherlock Holmes, with the sole assets of Steward Chaney's sets and the charming, if superfluous Mme. Novotna, will not satisfy Doyle addicts, who have waited since the days...