Another thing that made me start thinking about it is the rumored appearance of Nicholas Rowe's (as matinee Sherlock)as and actor playing Sherlock Holmes in an up coming movie.
Would you film it with the lead actor telling the story in flash backs with a younger actor playing the younger Holmes.
Or would you use make-up to make the lead actor look older of younger at various times in the tale.
It would be interesting to see how film would handle a story like this.
And it is also interesting to note that the upcoming film I was talking about, 'A Slight Trick of the Mind' is now going to be called 'Mr. Holmes'.
Granada filmed "The Musgrave Ritual" as the 50-somethings Brett and Hardwicke spending the weekend at the estate of Holmes' old college buddy (how totally unHolmes-like) during which Bruton's disappearance just happens to occur. The episode even opens with Holmes and Watson in the trap dragging the large tin box with Holmes' old cases out to Hurlstone just so the opening dialog of the short story can be shoehorned in the the TV show. In this case, a younger actor playing Holmes in an extended flashback would have worked better, but then the question becomes, "Where are you going to find a 23 year old actor who can convincingly play young-Brett-as-Sherlock?" Of course, if you start out a TV series with a 27 year old Holmes and 29 year old Watson in "A Study in Scarlet", you can use the same actor in a flashback recounting of GLOR. Hard to imagine Rathbone, Wontner, or Brett doing GLOR without changing the plot significantly--and then Old Trevor's written confession of thirty years is the most exiting part of the story. Do you do a flashback in a flashback?
ReplyDeleteIt would take a lot of work to find two actors who would be convincing as an older and younger Holmes.
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