Best-Worst-Last-First-Whatever Lists

[Mayerling]

For me the definitive Holmes has always been Basil Rathbone. I have a fondness for the series of films he starred in even if dear old Nigel Bruce did play a buffoonish Watson. Many of the actors who portrayed Holmes though were really years too old to play Holmes in his prime. Wontner was in his mid-fifties, Rathbone late forties, for example.

We know that William Gillette played Sherlock Holmes on stage. Presumably Conan Doyle saw his performance at some time. I wonder whether he ever saw any Sherlock Holmes films, the silent 'The Return of Sherlock Holmes' with Clive Brook in 1929, for instance, and what his reaction would have been.

It's rather odd but none of us have mentioned John Barrymore's 1922 silent film portrayal in "Sherlock Holmes" with Roland Young as Dr. Watson. One of the villains is played by a just starting out young film actor named William Powell.

I have heard that recently someone found the long missing silent film version of "Sherlock Holmes" that starred Gillette. But I don't know how true this is.

There was also a series of silent films that Doyle did like with Elie Norwood playing the detective. Most have been lost.

Doyle was fascinated by film, and most enthusiastic about the 1925 production of "The Lost World", with Wallace Beery as "Professor George Challenger" and Lewis Stone as "Lord John Roxton". In fact Doyle actually tried to get into the film, pretending to be Challenger wearing a thick black "Assyrian - style" beard as the character is supposed to have (and as Beery does wear in the film), but the sequence was dropped (though there are still photos showing Doyle done up that way.

Jeff

[Mayerling]

My S.H. list:

1-Arthur Wontner
2-Basil Rathbone
3-Jeremy Brett

Hi Stan,

Thanks for remembering Wontner - now somewhat overshadowed (despite playing Holmes in several films) by Rathbone.

Jeff

[Mayerling]

I certainly haven't viewed them all but Reginald Owen is, in my opinion, the worst Holmes I've seen. Others must have agreed because I think he only played him once.

Oddly enough Owen also played Dr. Watson in an early talkie. He is not good, and I found myself wishing there had been more of the villain in that film, Alan Dinehart (a now forgotten actor who was actually very good in all roles). The film was "A Study in Scarlet" (but had little to do with the two part - half anti-Mormon western novella) that Doyle wrote in 1886 and published in December 1887). Dinehart played "Jasper Merridew" (who is not even a character in "A Study in Scarlet" - the anti-hero is Jefferson Hope, avenging his love and her father, Lucy and John Ferrier), and Merridew's name only appears in a far later story (I think "The Adventure of the Empty House" as part of a group of "M" names in Holmes' files - he knocked out Holmes tooth in some confrontation). Merridew did not even have a first name in Doyle's story. Anna May Wong played a femme fatale assistant to Dinehart.

I do like Owen, who was a good actor in dramatic parts (he's the greedy claim jumping villain in "The Call of the Wild" with Clark Gable and Jack Oakie), and comic roles ("Petticoat Fever" - try to catch the unreal dinner party scene where Owen sticks out like a sore thumb without planning to do so). Of course he is best recalled for the 1938 turn as Ebenezer Scrooge in "A Christmas Carol" - possibly the best performance in that role until eclipsed by Alistair Sim and George C. Scott.

Jeff

[sdreid]

I certainly haven't viewed them all but Reginald Owen is, in my opinion, the worst Holmes I've seen. Others must have agreed because I think he only played him once.

[Rosella]

For me the definitive Holmes has always been Basil Rathbone. I have a fondness for the series of films he starred in even if dear old Nigel Bruce did play a buffoonish Watson. Many of the actors who portrayed Holmes though were really years too old to play Holmes in his prime. Wontner was in his mid-fifties, Rathbone late forties, for example.

We know that William Gillette played Sherlock Holmes on stage. Presumably Conan Doyle saw his performance at some time. I wonder whether he ever saw any Sherlock Holmes films, the silent 'The Return of Sherlock Holmes' with Clive Brook in 1929, for instance, and what his reaction would have been.

[sdreid]

My S.H. list:

1-Arthur Wontner
2-Basil Rathbone
3-Jeremy Brett

[Robert]

It's Holmes, but not as we know him :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N64G0a9-jvE

[Mayerling]

Christopher Plummer

Best film/television Holmes:

Rathbone
Downey
Plummer
John Neville
Peter Cushing
Sir Christopher Lee

Cumberbatch
Brett
Johnny Lee Miller
Ronald Howard

Best Moriarty's:

Andrew Scott (I love watching this fun loving psycho in action!)
George Zucco
Lionel Atwill
Henry Daniell

Special mention - Leo McKern, as a comic "Moriarty" in the movie "Sherlock Holmes' Smarter Brother".

Jeff

[Steadmund Brand]

I would put Jeremy Brett at the top for playing Holmes the closest to the character as written.

I think Rathbone and Cumberbatch are both fine actors, but their turns as Holmes suffer a little for being set in different time periods. Same as "Elementary" star Johnny Lee Miller.

So my list would be:

Jeremy Brett
Basil Rathbone (after all, he was the first I saw, when his movies were on TV)
Benedict Cumberthach
Johnny Lee Miller
Robert Downey Jr.

Christopher Plummer

[Pcdunn]

I would put Jeremy Brett at the top for playing Holmes the closest to the character as written.

I think Rathbone and Cumberbatch are both fine actors, but their turns as Holmes suffer a little for being set in different time periods. Same as "Elementary" star Johnny Lee Miller.

So my list would be:

Jeremy Brett
Basil Rathbone (after all, he was the first I saw, when his movies were on TV)
Benedict Cumberthach
Johnny Lee Miller
Robert Downey Jr.

[John Wheat]

^ What about Jeremy Brett, who played him in four TV series in the 1980s/90s? Not keen?

To Rosella

Jeremy Brett was okay as Holmes but I much prefer Rathbone and Cumberbatch.

Cheers John

[Rosella]

Best Sherlock Holmes
1. Basil Rathbone
2. Benedict Cumberbatch

^ What about Jeremy Brett, who played him in four TV series in the 1980s/90s? Not keen?

[sdreid]

Last two people living on Earth who were born in the 1800s:

1-Susannah Jones-Born July 6 of 1899

2-Emma Martinuzzi-Born November 29 of 1899

[sdreid]

The two actors who've played Paladin:

1-John Dehner-106 radio episodes

2-Richard Boone-225 television episodes

[John Wheat]

Best Sherlock Holmes
1. Basil Rathbone
2. Benedict Cumberbatch