"The Hound of the Baskervilles" adapted for the theatre by Steven Canny and John Nicolson

A classic Sherlock Holmes story reinterpreted as farce.

On Tuesday 6th August 2024, I saw the Devonshire Park Theatre’s in-house production of ‘The Hound of the Baskervilles’. The cod-horror melodrama of the story was superbly sent-up in a hilarious farce which reminded me of ‘The Play That Goes Wrong’, particularly in its use of meta-theatre to garner laughs.

I repeatedly laughed out loud with the rest of the audience.

Many of the laughs came from the use of three actors to play multiple roles with the need for swift changes and the consequent opportunities for humour when these proved impossible.

The script by Steven Canny and John Nicolson was clever and the physical theatre often ingenious. The lighting brilliantly created atmosphere and the sound effects were clever and perfectly timed. Stand out moments included:

• The recap of the first half (at breakneck speed) at the start of the second half, purportedly provoked by a post on social media criticising one actor’s pedestrian delivery.
• The trick shot on the billiard table.
• The false beard in the mouth.
• The use of frames, both in terms of the picture frames in the billiard room and the window frame through which the actors had to leave.

The three actors (Andrew Pollard, Ben Roddy and Tom Richardson) worked superbly as a team. I lost count of the number of parts Andrew Pollard played and Tom Richardson was the perfect straight man (well, usually). Ben Roddy used his experience as a panto dame to the full in what was virtually a frequently bawdy pantomime. But it is important to say that the technical team behind this production were also excellent. There were a lot of ‘effects’ and plenty of opportunity for things to go wrong but it all worked perfectly and the timing was always spot-on.

This was an ingenious and energetic reinterpretation of a classic and a near capacity audience enjoyed it enormously.

This review was written by the author of Bally and Bro, Motherdarling  and The Kids of God