Sherlock Holmes

This looks like a fun way to start the new Open Air Theatre season, with a new stage adventure for Arthur Conan Doyle’s immortal detective. Holmes is a complicated figure to stage, so easy to bog down in Victorian kitsch that he lends himself more to comedy adaptations than easnest ones. This play from Joel Horwood sounds like it is going for the latter, and certainly the OAT is the perfect venue for a big, bracing romp. The story follows Sherlock and Watson as they hit a slump following their first big case, only to have things turned around by the arrival of a woman with a mysterious jewel. There are quite a lot of Holmes stories involving women and mysterious jewels, so whether this is straight uo adaptation or more of a composite is TBC, but it sounds like Horwood has deliberately aimed for a younger Holmes, origin story type set up to ease audiences into the detective’s world. Joshua James plays the title role, in a production directed by Sean Holmes (on a sabbatical from London’s other big open air theatre, the Globe).