Review: Sherlock Holmes & The Ripper Murders – Yvonne Arnaud Theatre

Published on: 29 Sep, 2015
Updated on: 29 Sep, 2015

Sherlock Holmes & The Ripper Murders

By Ferenc Hepp

This week at the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre we are transported back to dark and shady Victorian England, where we meet various characters, some of whom will be more familiar to modern audiences than others.

Sherlock Holmes played by Samuel Clemens

The ‘Jack The Ripper’ murders are the talk of the town and Sherlock Holmes, played by Samuel Clemens – the son of the author of the play Brian Clemens who sadly passed away in January this year, is determined to get to the bottom of these murders, alongside his trusted sidekick, Dr Watson, played by George Telfer.

There is not much set, in fact, the locations depicted in the production are represented by projection onto a number of strips of white cloth. This is getting more and more popular nowadays with productions, especially touring shows in order to reduce cumbersome and time consuming scene changes, however, this should be justified with clear images which change in a subtle way in between scenes.

Sadly, this was not the case in this production. It looked like one of the drapes was put up in a hurry and needed a good iron, if you were even slightly off centre, the images on the split drapes became blurred and looked rather amateurish. We see guests dancing at a party looking more like marionettes controlled by string, and people moving in the background appear to be ice skating rather than walking!

Dr Watson, played by George Telfer, of equal importance

This did bring some titters from the rather sparse audience, which was a shame as a lot of these were supposed to be in the middle of dramatic scenes.

The sound effects were also rather lacking in effectiveness, and again, murmurs were heard around the auditorium instead of gasps of horror, which would normally be the case for thrillers. In fact, in the case of one of the murders the actress experiencing Jack The Ripper’s knife even manages to walk off stage without falling over before we have a slightly delayed blackout.

Clemens, as Holmes, is rather monotone in Act 1 and the pace feels slow, with a lot of musical interludes which last a bit too long, however, this picks up in Act 2 and my attention was grabbed more as we got towards the end of Holmes’s investigations and eventual reveal of his conclusions.

Dr Watson plays a more significant role in his relationship with Holmes than we would normally expect in traditional tales, and even suggests at one point that he should “have equal importance” as Holmes.

This actually came across well, and I must also praise Kim Taylforth, who played the part of Mrs Hudson with a sense of sarcasm and intelligence, despite being a mere servant. This was one of the characters that had a sense of humour and I always looked forward to her appearances.

The drama is escalated well at the conclusion of the play involving the Prime Minister and Sir William Gull (the Queen’s physician), however, I felt that Gull’s part was a tad overplayed by Andrew Paul. His characteristics would have still come across with a little more subtlety.

This production will not leave you shaking in your boots, more like a slight discomfort in your slippers, however, if you feel like a night out in the friendly surroundings of the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre, it is playing there until Saturday 3 October and tickets are available via: www.yvonne-arnaud.co.uk or 01483 440000.

Star rating (out of five):