Sherlock Holmes & the First English Gentleman by Doug Warwick (Toronto Fringe 2008 Review)

Review by Sam Mooney

sherlock My 82 year old mother and 15 year old niece are fringing with me for three days. My mother loves big musicals but she’s open to seeing other theatre. She sees this as an experience. My niece doesn’t have a lot of theatre-going experience. As a bonus, Megan was with us.

The play was long by Fringe standards, 85 minutes. It could have ended at least 5 minutes earlier. None of us really understood why the last scene was included.

Peter Treadwell, who played Dr. Watson and other characters, was terrific. Not that Nick Cumming and Tina Sterling weren’t.

We all agreed that the play has potential but that something was lacking. We didn’t feel the energy that is such a wonderful part of a live performance. Maybe it was the heat. Maybe the audience was too wrung out to do their part.

Still, there were some terrific moments, some very funny lines and scenes. The joy of live theatre is that every performance is different, so, you never know, the next performance might be bursting with energy!