This is the second time in three years that Lighthouse Festival Theatre has included a Sherlock Holmes play as part of its season.
By Gary Smith | Special to the Hamilton Spectator
Saturday, June 28th, 2025
The great Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is no doubt spinning in his grave.
The master of moody mystery surely never intended his dark and demonic work about a howling hound to give voice to peals of exuberant laughter. Death on the English Moors cloaked by fog and fear is surely more what this 19th-century author had in mind.
No matter, Sir Arthur and his fearsome Baskerville Hound are served up by British playwrights Steven Canny and John Nicholson in a boldly comic vision that is sending audiences home happy.
In a slam-bang Lighthouse Theatre production, directed with style and intentional hambone histrionics by Derek Ritschel, you might wonder if the essence of Sir Arthur’s frightening tale survives in this arc of fresh new laughter.
Mostly, I’d say yes, though the original story does get somewhat lost in the non-stop silliness.
There’s plenty of gratuitous humour, for instance, of a pretty flimsy kind. If you think seeing a man shuffling across the stage in his underwear, trousers around his ankles is hilarious, this one’s for you.
If you think a man with a beard, wearing a dress and seductively flapping a fan is the height of comic invention, you just might laugh yourself silly.
You get the picture. The comedy here is of a British pantomime level that’s aimed at adults rather than children.
Don’t look for witty repartee; this Hound doesn’t run to that. But if you can satisfy yourself with bombast and visual high jinks, you just might have a swell time.
Director Ritschel keeps things in perpetual motion and his skilful cast of three makes the 17 characters they play entertaining.
Thank heavens for these mitigating factors. The pace of the shenanigans here suggests perpetual motion. There’s no time to stop and question the ridiculous goings on.
If you are a fan of Sherlock Holmes mysteries, however, you might not enjoy seeing this classic one sent so far up the comedy scale. You might not be so willing to suspend annoyance with the way Arthur Conan Doyle’s play has been frantically massaged in this comic version that kids the pants off everything.
If, however, you’re willing to play along, three fine actors with handsome pedigrees will make you woof with laughter.
In truth, these guys work like dogs to make this Hound bark. All three actors have terrific credits with major international theatres, and they work here like some finely oiled machine that keeps right on ticking through multiple costume changes and physical action.
Andrew Scanlon is wily Sherlock Holmes, imbuing the character with appropriate ego and panache. Jonathan Ellul is his canny Watson, trying to be in charge, even when we know he’s clearly not. And Sweeney Macarthur plays Sir Henry Baskerville with bravado and style.
Of course, all three have fun with the other rambunctious characters who turn up on the Lighthouse Festival stage. It would be wrong to spoil your fun by telling you who they are. If you want to know you’ll have to head to Port Dover, or Port Colborne, to find out.
Set designer William Chesney’s suggestion of the play’s multiple settings is definitely more functional than inspired. Its parameters also forced Ritschel’s staging too frequently to the stage right side of the theatre. There was a blandness to the look of this production that is unusual for Chesney, who is normally a designer of great style. Similarly, Emerson Kafarowski’s lighting failed to suggest vital mood and atmosphere.
This is the second time in three years that Lighthouse Festival Theatre has included a Sherlock Holmes play as part of its season. Last time it was Canadian playwright Peter Colley’s “The Real Sherlock Holmes” that brought Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of the sleuth in the deerstalker hat, to Port Dover in a play that posed some interesting thoughts about how Holmes came to be such a quintessential character.
Of course, the old black and white films starring Basil Rathbone and the TV series with elegant Jeremy Brett inhabiting the heart and mind of Holmes still remain perfect Holmes nostalgia.
I don’t think anyone has come up with such an outrageous spoof about the man with the pipe and the big time ego, as Canny and Nicholson have with their slapstick take on “The Hound of the Baskervilles.”
So, is this “Hound” a dog? Not if you like comedy that chases its tale to make you laugh.
Opinion articles are based on the author’s interpretations and judgments of facts, data and events. More details
Gary Smith has written about theatre and dance for The Hamilton Spectator, as well as a variety of international publications, for more than 40 years.
