If the name “Sherlock Holmes” brings to mind suspense, mystery, and incredible feats of deduction, flush such thoughts and buckle all safety belts for one of the Alley Theatre’s wildest, rip-roaring comedies in many a day. In their production of Ken Ludwig’s “Baskerville: a Sherlock Holmes Mystery,” the only mystery is how the show could be funnier.
Not that this case, loosely based on one of Arthur Conan Doyle’s most gothic adventures, “The Hound of the Baskervilles,” is pure comedy for everyone. Doctor Watson (Christopher Salazar) in the opening scene calls it “the strangest and most dangerous case” in Holmes’s career, and Holmes himself (Todd Waite) is all business as he undertakes to solve the death of Sir Charles Baskerville in the moors on his estate in Devonshire and keep alive Sir Charles’ heir, Henry (Dylan Godwin), who has come from Texas to claim his inheritance. But while Waite and Salazar play their famous roles with perfectly anxious aplomb, Godwin, Elizabeth Bunch, and Brandon Hearnsberger play all the show’s eight or nine other characters with the clownish exaggeration of a farce. It’s from this clash of worlds that “Baskerville”’s humor explodes onto the stage. For whether they be playing a flirting maid cleaning Holmes’s floor (Godwin), a German housekeeper with a loose control of English and a mile-high hairdo (Bunch), or the portrait of one of the Baskerville’s bewigged ancestors (Hearnsberger), they do everything possible to contrast with the ever-intense Holmes and Watson. Serious or comic, every actor is more than up to the task, and the laughs just keep coming.
Much of the credit goes to costume designer Sarah Cubbage whose quick-change outfits make seemingly impossible character transformations happen. But she also makes sure they contrast with Holmes’s richly tailored Edwardian smoking jackets and traveling suits—as well as Dr. Watson’s more bland but professional attire. And just as the players step to the wings for their speedy changes, John Coyne’s sets slide and roll around the stage to move the characters from London’s Baker Street to a car on a train and to the Grimpen Mire near Devonshire’s Dartmoor Prison. Seldom have costumes and set contributed as much hilarity as here.
Director Eleanor Holdridge keeps everything moving at a frantic pace, even allowing for a few special effects from the murderous Hound, milking every laugh from Ludwig’s clever script. And for Holmes purists, she does so while managing to keep the mystery story alive and well. Holmes readers will recognize every step on the play’s progress to solving Doyle’s original mystery.
This is a show designed for pure enjoyment on a variety of levels, and it offers a fitting exit for actor Todd Waite who is retiring from the Alley after 25 years with the theatre’s resident company. Holmes is not his deepest role, but, like Waite himself, it is an audience pleaser handled with finesse and humanity. He understands his part in the whole and plays it with a zest that leaves ample room for the other actors and crew to shine.
See “Baskerville” to honor Todd Waite. See it to revel in Ken Ludwig’s clever script. See it for the amazing comic performances of Bunch, Godwin, and Hearnsberger. But see it. The mystery is why anyone would stay away.
Robert Donahoo, Sam Houston State University. “Baskerville: A Sherlock Holmes Mystery” plays at Houston’s Alley Theatre through May 4.
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