Baker Street
OPENING: February 16, 1965
CLOSING: November 14, 1965
Seen: May 1965
LOCATION: Broadway Theater
Happy Thanksgiving to my American readers! I hope your Turkey Day was a lovely one.
If being a theater kid turned theatre worker has taught me anything, it’s that if a piece of pop culture has enough of a following, someone will eventually try to set it to music and put it on stage. Sometimes this works; The Producers, 20 years later, still holds the record for most Tony wins and Oliver still stands as a timeless classic. Disney has made an art of transforming their movies into incredible stage spectacles. However, some pieces just do not work. Jane Eyre, the classic Bronte novel, lasted six months in 2001-2002. Pretty Woman, the much beloved Rom-Com of the 1980s, opened on Broadway to a lackluster response (This one is doing well on it’s national tour, but it will never be considered a classic). Musical Productions of Lord of the Rings and Gone with the Wind died early in tryouts. And in a few weeks from now, I will be touching on the disaster that was Spiderman: Turn Off the Dark. (Anyone want to take a guess what that entry I will be discussing it in? Stay tuned for December 22nd’s edition of Guess the Show).
This need to put treasured classics on stage was no different in the sixties. As producers were scrambling for ideas, they turned to classic literature. And that is how, in February of 1965, a Sherlock Holmes adaptation titled “Baker Street” reached the Broadway Theatre.
What every good producer knows is that to succeed on Broadway, the story has to be appealing to the masses. As Arthur Conan Doyle’s titular character had been entrancing the world for over fifty years, the idea checked that box instantly.
Baker Street was not a direct adaptation. Most of the Sherlock Holmes stories were short stories written for magazines, nowhere near long enough to turn into a full length musical. In order create one, stories had to be expanded and liberties had to be taken. To try and achieve this lofty goal, book writer Jerome Coopersmith took three Holmes stories and used elements of all three to create Baker Street.
But there remained some additional complications. Readers of Conan Doyle flocked to his stories because of the intrigue of the brilliant and mysterious crime catcher. If you actually examine the character of Holmes, he is actually an irascible, anti-social drug addict who believes he is above the law. If that sounds familiar, you may be remembering the 2000’s era medical drama House M.D., which was a loose modern adaptation set in a different profession. But audiences were different in the 60’s – how were they to connect with such a heathen?
The answer was in the loose adaptation. Coopersmith took the characters of Sherlock Holmes (Fritz Weaver), Moriarty (Martin Gabel), and Irene Adler (Inga Swenson) and adjusted them to make them more appealing. He also created a new plotline where Moriarty is attempting to steal the jewels from Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee.
While his intentions were novel, well intentioned, and even admirable, Coopersmith’s efforts fell flat. My own first impression while looking at a photo was “Why the Hell is Sherlock on stage with Vegas showgirls?” Nowhere in the original lore is there anywhere where Holmes even got close to a showgirl, let alone a whole line of them. Also in the original lore – Irene Adler was in the very first Holmes story and then never made another appearance. So for a man to show up in her dressing room dressed as George Bernard Shaw? Critic Howard Taubman pointed this moment out specifically as feeling forced. I would have to agree. Coopersmith went so far as to have Irene falling in love with Sherlock – an absolutely preposterous idea to anyone who has read any amount of Conan Doyle and an obvious attempt to make this show fit with the culture of the time.
Baker Street closed after ten months. It had been eagerly awaited – so much so that an extremely formal dress code was enforced in the theatre before the show even opened. In the end, the show was just too outlandish to last. Neither Bock and Harnick’s added music nor Hal Prince’s direction could save it. But I must acknowledge that two significant Broadway debuts were made in the Baker Street ensemble: Tommy Tune and Christopher Walken.
Broadway is going to have flops, but that doesn’t mean that we should forget them. Fritz Weaver, the man who played Sherlock, had a long and prolific career. His last Broadway credit was in 1999 with several more stage appearances after. He died in 2016 at the age of 90.
For what it’s worth – my Dad adores Sherlock Holmes. Was this because of Baker Street? I don’t know. But maybe it was – and for me, that would make this travesty of a show worth it’s short and unsuccessful run.
I have no doubt that someone someday will try to write another Sherlock Holmes musical. If they’re smart, they will use the lessons Baker Street taught us on what mistakes not to make. After all – it’s elementary, my dear Watson.
CAST: ORIGINAL
CAPTAIN GREGG: Patrick Horgan
DR. WATSON: Peter Sallis
MRS. HUDSON: Paddy Edwards
SHERLOCK HOLMES: Fritz Weaver
INSPECTOR LESTRADE: Daniel Keyes
IRENE ADLER: Inga Swenson
DAISY: Virginia Vestoff
BAXTER: Martin WOLFSON
WIGGINS: Teddy Green
Duckbellows: Bert Michaels
NIPPER: Sal Pernice
PERKINS: George Lee
MACIPPER: Mark Jude Sheil
MURILLO: Jay Norman
THE THREE KILLERS: Avin Harum, Christopher Walken, Tommy Tune
TAVERN SINGER: Gwenn Lewis
PROFESSOR MORIARTY: Martin Gabel
DANCERS: Sara Lee Barber, Barbara Blair, Lois Castle, John Grigas, Gwenn Lewis, Diana Saunders
SINGERS: Martin Ambrose, Frank Bouley, Jack Dabdoub, Gay Edmond, Judie Elkins, Maria Graziano, Horace Guittard, Peter Johl, Mara Landi, Hal Norman, Vera Walton
Bordman, Gerald. “American Musical Theatre: A Chronicle.” New York: Oxford University Press, Inc., 1978.
Internet Broadway Database. “Jane Eyre”. Accessed October 2022. https://www.ibdb.com/broadway-show/jane-eyre-10307
Playbill. “Tony-Winning Broadway and Film Actor Fritz Weaver is Dead at 90” November 28, 2016. https://playbill.com/article/tony-winning-broadway-and-film-actor-fritz-weaver-is-dead-at-90
Skethway, Nathan. “Look Back at Baker Street on Broadway.” Playbill.com, February 19, 2019. https://playbill.com/article/look-back-at-baker-street-on-broadway
Taubman, Howard “Theater: Sherlock Holmes to Music; ‘Baker Street’ Arrives at the Broadway.” New York Times, February 17, 1965. https://www.nytimes.com/1965/02/17/archives/theater-sherlock-holmes-to-music-baker-street-arrives-at-the.html?searchResultPosition=2
Tony Awards. www.tonyawards.com. Accessed September 2022.
