I can pull it off,” Arquette unconfidently said about playing the title role in this production. “I’m not always necessarily someone’s first choice, but I have a little bit of range. You get the sense he’s a fanboy of the role and it’s a stretch that he landed it. Going in, I struggled to see David Arquette being able to pull off this role – and for good reason. Even worse, never do you get the sense that you’re actually immersed in the darkly disturbed world of Sherlock Holmes. Never do you feel a dangerous rivalry between them. I could even imagine the original Sherlock actors sitting in the audience – crying beside me.Īttempting for comedy rather than dramatic intrigue, this version of Sherlock blows kisses to his arch nemesis Moriarty – something you’d never see Benedict Cumberbatch, Robert Downey Jr., Buster Keaton, Roger Moore or Basil Rathbone caught dead doing. I’m left feeling pity for all the previous versions of Sherlock Holmes I’ve seen done right. Starvox Entertainment and June Entertainment’s “Sherlock Holmes” has stripped out all the mystery, intrigue, tension, drama and danger and replaced it with cheesy, cheeky and campy comedy that doesn’t deliver. Photo credit: Starvox Entertainment, June Entertainment John Watson and Renee Olstead as Lady Irene St. 29, 2015 until it tours elsewhere.ĭavid Arquette as Sherlock Holmes (center), James Maslow as Dr. Thankfully, the one-week limited engagement only runs in Chicago from Nov. This Thanksgiving, spend your time anywhere but with David Arquette’s “Sherlock Holmes” at the Oriental Theatre. Campy being the only word to accurately convey this alternate-reality version of Sherlock Holmes with an original script, writer Greg Kramer and director Andrew Shaver try too hard to be different without ever figuring out why. CHICAGO – Different isn’t bad and might be great, but you’d better have an irrefutable reason to change what was never broken.