Thursday, May 19, 2016

'Sherlock Holmes and the American Problem'



As long as there isn't the wooden and annoying Benedict Cumberbatch as Sherlock Holmes, I'll watch that production or television series. Seattle Repertory Theatre's newly commissioned 'Sherlock Holmes and the American Problem' definitely held more palatable (not about eye candy) actors.

Written by R. Hamilton Wright, and directed by Allison Narver, the play meshed together the American Wild West and Victorian England and tossed up a mystery in the streets of London during the Queen's Jubilee. American sharpshooter Annie Oakley (Christine Marie Brown) crosses the pond to London in June 1887 with Buffalo Bill's Wild West extravaganza. Of course there're mysteries to be solved, and we see Sherlock Holmes (Darragh Kennan), Dr Watson (Andrew McGinn) and Mrs Hudson (Marianne Owen).

There was lots of laughter in the audience as the Britons talk about how the Americans have 'invaded' London during this Jubilee year and how Americans are 'gun lovers'. LOL. I wasn't really following the mysteries or how they're being solved. It was rather confusing and more than a tad incoherent. I was more interested in how the play captured the character traits of Holmes and Watson, and how the actors fleshed those out. Those were nicely done. Darragh Kennan is reprising this role of Sherlock Holmes and he has sunk into it really well. I like his Sherlock. Andrew McGinn's Watson pairs well with this Sherlock. Great chemistry on stage.

The Seattle Times wasn't that impressed with it, and explained the plot as such,

But he’s intrigued by a forthright American (Oakley, he soon discovers) who begs him to search for her missing brother, and by another accomplished female Yank (played by Cheyenne Casebier) — an engineer who’s lost track of her “mole,” a burrowing, earth-moving machine. (The humorous resemblance to Bertha, the tunneling device that has given Seattle construction delays and municipal headaches, is no accident.)

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