Barrett Sherlock - The Television Companion

1. Auflage 2021
ISBN: 978-3-7487-7577-5
Verlag: BookRix
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection

E-Book, Englisch, 162 Seiten

The game is on! Sherlock - The Television Companion is the ultimate guide to the cult BBC television series starring Benedict Cumberbatch as Sherlock Holmes.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Barrett, Jack

Leseproben

INTRODUCTION - THE GAME IS ON!
  Believe it or not, Sherlock was not considered to be a sure thing at its inception. The original version (which apparently cost £800,000) of A Study in Pink was canned by the BBC and they decided to reshoot the entire episode. When word of this got out it led to whispers that the BBC thought they had a dud on their hands and were doing some damage control. Media onlookers assumed this was rather like the television version of unhappy movie studios deciding to reshoot large chunks of a film they have just made because they didn't think the end product was very good.   The whispers regarding Sherlock were very mistaken though. The BBC were not reshooting A Study in Pink because they thought they had a dud on their hands. The complete opposite was the actual truth. The BBC were reshooting A Study in Pink because they wanted Sherlock's episodes to be ninety minutes long instead of an hour. They also wanted to improve the production values - a move which suggested nothing but confidence in Sherlock. The BBC sensed that Sherlock had the potential to be a big hit so they wanted to go the extra mile and make the show as good as it could possibly be. Appropriately enough for a feature length show (albeit with only three episodes per season), the new and improved Sherlock was impressively cinematic and slick when it finally hit the small screen.   You might even say that Sherlock caught everyone by surprise when it was first transmitted. No one had really expected it to be this good or find such a big audience. And yet, there was no reason why there should have been too much doubt at all about the appeal of Sherlock. The creators Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss are not exactly short of work nor the sort of people willing to put their name to any old rubbish. Sherlock was plainly a labour of love for both of them and something they'd put an awful lot of time and effort into planning. The huge success and popularity of Sherlock was beyond what was expected but there never anything less than confidence in the product.   Perhaps the doubt about the prospects for Sherlock came from the public domain status of the character. There have been so many film and television adaptations of Sherlock Holmes you could be forgiven for losing track of them. Some feared we might have reached a point of Sherlock Holmes saturation where there was little left to do with the character that was new or novel. There has been a Russian Sherlock, comedy spoofs, cheapo Canadian television Sherlock Holmes movies, Sherlock Holmes inspired characters like Hugh Laurie in House, about a gazillion adaptations of The Hound of the Baskervilles, and millions of other Holmes productions. Everyone from Roger Moore to Christopher Lee has played Sherlock Holmes. Playing Sherlock Holmes is rather like playing Hamlet. Actors have played the role before you and actors will play the role after you.   You could then forgive the general public a certain degree of Sherlock Holmes fatigue upon hearing that the BBC were making a new series featuring the great detective. The prospect of a new Sherlock Holmes show was hardly the most exciting prospect at first glance. Most people have read the books and watched far too many Sherlock Holmes films and TV shows. It was hard to see how the new show could anything that hadn't been done before.   For many, the last word in Sherlock Holmes television shows is the 1980s Granada series with Jeremy Brett. This show is still the ultimate comfort television. It is cosily Victorian with handsome production values and impressive period details. The show was also quite faithful to the literary source. For people of a certain age, Sherlock Holmes will probably always be Jeremy Brett. Brett's tightly wound, theatrical, somewhat camp, dramatic, and highly entertaining portrayal of Holmes was always compelling. If you are going to do a faithful period adaptation of the Conan Doyle books then the Granada series is hard to beat.   The clever thing about the concept of Moffat and Gatiss though is that they had no intention of treading on the hallowed turf of the Granada show. Their inspiration was not Jeremy Brett at all but Basil Rathbone. Moffat and Gatiss had a particular fondness for the films where Rathbone's Holmes was taken out of his period trappings and placed in the present day (the 1940s in this case) to battle Nazis during the war. Moffat and Gatiss thought this was fun and the sort of thing that more Sherlock Holmes adaptations should have done. They felt this would make the character seem more relevant and more relatable. They loved the idea of depicting a Sherlock Holmes who lived in the modern world.   Take James Bond for example. James Bond is a Cold War character in the Ian Fleming books. He is a product of the 1950s. The big bad of the Bond books is often the Soviet Union. However, in the James Bond films Bond is always in the present day. The Cold War has long gone. Fashions change, technology changes, but Bond is still more or less Bond - only in the present rather than the 1950s.   The concept of Moffat and Gatiss then was similar to James Bond. What would Sherlock Holmes be like if he lived in the London of 2010? Well, he'd use modern technology and dress differently, but nothing substantial would change. He'd still be Sherlock Holmes. There would still be crimes, mysteries, and murders to solve. The core qualities of the character, his eccentricity and brilliance, would still be in place. The decision by Moffat and Gatiss to set their version of Sherlock Holmes in the present day gave this show a freshness and novelty that set it apart from the countless other productions featuring the great detective. It was something different and people embraced that.   In (fairly) recent years the BBC had made two handsome Sherlock Holmes films featuring Richard Roxburgh and Rupert Everett as Holmes respectively. However, neither of these productions created much buzz or lodged in the memory. They were both period pieces and felt too familiar * to what had gone before and so didn't stand out from the crowd. The modern Sherlock show by Moffat and Gattis did stand out though. It almost immediately became a big domestic hit with positive critical reviews. It also proved popular in international markets. The modern setting was clearly appealing for a number of casual viewers who might not ordinarily have watched a Sherlock Holmes film or TV adaptation.   The show soon attracted a passionate and devoted fanbase. What was the appeal of Sherlock? Why was it so successful? Well, aside from the novelty of a modern setting, a salient factor in the appeal of Sherlock was humour. Sherlock is a witty show. Steven Moffat has noted how many Sherlock Holmes adaptations are rather stuffy and heritage. They sometimes take themselves too seriously and forget that the Conan Doyle books were witty and often amusing. Moffat is a witty writer himself (see how drab, flat, and unfunny Chris Chibnall's writing on Doctor Who is compared to the days when Moffat was the showrunner) and so Sherlock has plenty of wit and humour.   Another obvious factor in the success of Sherlock is Benedict Cumberbatch. Benedict Cumberbatch was the only person who auditioned for the lead role in Sherlock. They didn't bother to look at anyone else because they knew Cumberbatch was perfect. Moffat and Gatiss had seen the actor in the film Atonement and were desperate to cast him. At the time, despite already having a decent number of stage and screen appearances under his belt, not many people knew who Benedict Cumberbatch was. That all changed when Sherlock came out. The show catapulted Benedict Cumberbatch to stardom and he is now a film star and leading man. In fact, one of the biggest obstacles of ever making Sherlock again in the future would be finding a time when Benedict Cumberbatch was actually available.   The chemistry between the two leads is also an important component in the success of Sherlock and so much credit has to go to Martin Freeman. While the producers only had eyes on Cumberbatch for the part of Sherlock this was not the case with Watson. Several actors tested for the part of Watson. These included, as most Sherlock fans will know, Matt Smith. Smith was deemed too eccentric to be a good foil for Cumberbatch but Moffat clearly took note of Smith because he cast him as Doctor Who. Smith seemed more like Sherlock Holmes than Dr Watson. In the end the producers settled on Martin Freeman as Watson and one can see why in the show. Freeman makes John Watson a down to earth likeable everyman. He is the perfect deadpan foil for Sherlock.   The format of Sherlock (which one could describe as three 90 minute episodes once in a blue moon) was both a strength and a weakness (for reasons which we'll talk more about in the book that follows). It was definitely a strength that Sherlock was rationed. This meant that we never grew weary or bored of the show. We were always left wanting more than we actually got. There was, on the flip side, unavoidably a frustration in this. Fans had to wait ages for new episodes. Because there were so few episodes of Sherlock (relative to other TV shows) the new episodes, when they arrived, had a lot of expectation and anticipation. They were judged very harshly in the end if they were not deemed to be brilliant. You can't help feeling that Sherlock should at the very least have had a few more special episodes.   What ultimately made producing new episodes of Sherlock such a complex task was not enthusiasm or willingness but availability. Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman are two of the busiest actors on the planet. It's difficult...