Ms. Holmes & Ms. Watson – Apt 2b. By Kate Hamill. The Arcola, Studio 1, 24 Ashwin Street, London E8 until 20 December 2025, 2☆☆. Review: William Russell.

Photo Credit: Alex Brenner.

Ms. Holmes & Ms. Watson – Apt 2b. By Kate Hamill. The Arcola, Studio 1, 24 Ashwin Street, London E8 until 20 December 2025,

2☆☆. Review: William Russell.

“A turkey for Christmas.”

This spoof by Kate Hamill set in a post pandemic London on Conan Doyle's great detective and his chum is even more impenetrable than anything the great man ever devised for his dynamic duo to solve. Hamill, an American playwright and actress, makes a habit of this. She has brought the works of others like Jane Austen and Lucy M Alcott to the stage and this play first surfaced four years ago in Kansas. Her reputation in America is considerable but as far as this play is concerned what started in Kansas should have stayed in Kansas because in spite of the strenuous efforts of the cast and director Sean Turner not only do the goings on in what should surely be Flat 2b – actually it is the set of the Arcola's previous offering redressed – prove impossible to understand and never soar to any comic heights. Feminists should protest. Ms Watson, played by Simona Brown, is a doctor on a back packing tour of Europe who is taken by Mrs Hudson to the flat where it seems she will have to share the living room with Ms Holmes, played by Lucy Farrett. Reluctantly Ms Watson joins the great detective as her amanuensis and the game, whatever it is, and if anybody ever finds out it will be a miracle, is afoot. Naturally Irene Adler, played by Alice Lucy, slinking around the set like crazy, turns up as do Lestrade, Elliot Monk and Moriarty all played by Tendai Humphrey Sitima and that is that. The audience did come back after the interval but left no wiser than they had been at the end of Act One. The cast work with a will, Farrett makes a suitably inscrutable Holmes - Sherlock not Sheila as she keeps insisting - and there are occasional hints of lesbianism, but the mystery remains unsolved – why did anybody bother to put the piece on? It is indeed a turkey for Christmas.

Cast

Lucy Ferrett – Sherlock Holmes

Simona Brown – Dr Joan Watson

Tendai Humphrey Sitima – Lestrade, Elliot Monk

Alice Lucy – Irene Adler, Mrs Hudson, Mrs Drebber

Creatives

Director – Sean Turner

Set Designer – Max Doray

Costume Designer – Sara Perks

Sound Designer – Hattie North

Lighting Designer – David Howe

Fight Director – Marcello Marascalchi