The League of Austen Artists: Is Benedict Cumberbatch the best Sherlock Holmes ever? (Wales On Line)

Jan 9 2012

Benedict Cumberbatch wasn’t a name many people could have claimed familiarity with before he strode on screen in the summer of 2010 in A Study in Pink – the very first episode of BBC’s Sherlock.

While not a complete unknown, for those who missed Hawking – a brilliant 2004 biopic about the British professor – he was best-known for an appearance alongside James McEvoy and Keira Knightley in the 2007 film Atonement.

But in his role as the literary sleuth, the 35-year-old has well and truly entered the public consciousness and in the process has opened up the tales of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle to a new generation of fans.

See also: Sherlock writer Steven Moffat furious with sexist claim

What is more, Cumberbatch has captured the imagination of many long-devoted Sherlock fans and is for many people’s money, including my own, the best to have donned the deerstalker.

He is up against quite a pantheon of talent, including the revered Basil Rathbone and Jeremy Brett.

But while South African-born Rathbone gave a cool, sophisticated and elegant version of Holmes in 14 movies from 1939 to 1946 and Brett practically became his character in 41 TV episodes spanning 10 years, Cumberbatch has gone beyond them.

For one thing, out of the 75 to have played Holmes, Cumberbatch has handled the most radical and unique challenge.

He has had the thankless task of making Sherlock seem credible in a modern society, catapulted more than 100 years forward from the Victorian era we are so used to seeing him in.

Gone are the hansom cabs and baker street boys, replaced by black taxis and spies, while Sherlock is no longer in the habit of sending telegrams so much as using a smartphone.

But Cumberbatch has managed to do so while losing nothing of the essence of a character which so many feel affection and ownership over.

The ex-Harrow pupil is helped by a seemingly natural theatrical pomp just like the antiquated Holmes, which is possibly innate given he is the son of actors, and has an intriguing face – perfect to play a man who is singular in his outlook on life and often makes a reader wonder how he ended up as he did.

Compare that to the crass retelling of Sherlock Holmes on film – the second instalment of which currently lies second at the UK box office – in which Robert Downey Jr attempts a barely-passable English accent. And you don’t have to be a purist to work out that bare-chest fighting wasn’t in the four novels or 56 short stories.

By contrast, Cumberbatch has added things which weren’t always there, but which have not detracted from the character. Take for example the humour displayed in last night’s second series’ second episode The Hounds of Baskerville.

He asks Inspector Lestrade why he has taken to “going around calling himself George”.

“That’s his name,” answers Martin Freeman, who does an equally admirable job as Dr Watson.
Once again last night Cumberbatch adroitly captured the eccentric symptoms of Holmes, from going “cold turkey” at the beginning of the episode to smooth-talking his way into the Baskerville animal testing lab.

Cumberbatch just is Holmes and while, of course, his authenticity has a great deal to do with the minutiae of Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss’ writing – they are two of the most knowledgeable men on the books walking the planet – his execution has meant no one has questioned the casting choice.
It can be a very different story. Former Doctor Who actor Tom Baker, who appeared in The Hounds of the Baskervilles) in 1982, wrote of the experience afterwards that he “couldn’t lift the character into that special world that makes Holmes so funny and fascinating”.

Meanwhile Christopher Lee looked too old to be Holmes in the TV films in which he starred.
But Cumberbatch has become Holmes as quickly as the great detective could surmise who you were from a tea stain on your napkin.

His performance as Sherlock has not gone unnoticed and he has joined the cast for Star Trek 2 as well starring in the upcoming Hollywood blockbuster War Horse, whose director Steven Spielberg recently called Cumberbatch “the best Sherlock Holmes on screen”. Who are we to argue?

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