Playing Sherlock Holmes

Playing Sherlock Holmes contains three verbatim interviews - with John Wood, Robert Stephens and Christopher Lee - about their very different experiences of appearing as Holmes on stage and screen. The interviews were conducted in 1974. At the time, John Wood was appearing on stage in an acclaimed revival of William Gillette’s play Sherlock Holmes, a Royal Shakespeare Company production; Robert Stephens had recently completed The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes for film director Billy Wilder; and Christopher Lee - who had a role as Mycroft Holmes in that film - had earlier played the lead role in Sherlock Holmes and the Deadly Necklace. The interviews have been transcribed from tapes held in the Arthur Conan Doyle Collection - Richard Lancelyn Green Bequest at Portsmouth Museum.

Keywords: Sherlock Holmes, John Wood, Robert Stephens, Christopher Lee, Royal Shakespeare Company, William Gillette, Billy Wilder, Terence Fisher, Dr Watson, Arthur Conan Doyle, The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes, Hound of the Baskervilles