On Playing Sherlock Holmes
Basil Rathbone, creator of radio’s version of Doyle’s famous sleuth, sees character as part of old England. The following is an article written by Basil Rathbone. Titled “On Playing Sherlock Holmes,” it was published in the March 1940 issue of Radio Varieties. Many persons ask me what is the difference in your feeling when you face the NBC microphone as Sherlock Holmes and when you face the camera. I would be only too willing to oblige them through Radio Varieties except that there is really no difference. In either case, I feel Holmes to be as real as my Dr. Watson, Mr. Nigel Bruce. Like countless millions of Holmes’ admirers throughout the world, I see him as a very part of old England. As I conceive him, and my concept may differ radically with those of Editor Wilton Rosenthal’s readers, Holmes was a man with tremendous powers of concentration. His absorption in his calling was extraordinary. Very properly, he never associated with women; evinced no interest in them. (Imagine what a hell it would have …