CDs: Holmes and Watson Sing

With the notable exception of the semi-revue A Day in Hollywood/ A Night in the Ukraine, the musicals produced on Broadway by Alexander H. Cohen tended to be flops, including Rugantino, A Time for Singing, Dear World, and I Remember Mama, with a couple of others Prettybelle, the Jerry Lewis Hellzapoppin folding on the road and never even making it to New York.

Another Cohen-produced failure was the 1965 Broadway musical Baker Street, which managed a run of 313 performances but ultimately lost money. A self-described "musical adventure," Baker Street was an adaptation of several of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's stories about detective Sherlock Holmes, borrowing elements from "The Adventure of the Empty House," "The Final Problem," "A Study in Scarlet," and "A Scandal in Bohemia." The latter was necessary to include as it was the only Holmes story in which there was a strong female character, something deemed necessary for a Broadway musical about the famous sleuth.

The mostly sturdy book for Baker Street was by Jerome Coopersmith, who would subsequently contribute material to the script of Jerry Bock and Sheldon Harnick's The Apple Tree. The Baker Street score was by Canadian newcomers Marion Grudeff and Raymond Jessel, with both working on music and lyrics. Jessel would be heard from again when Cohen brought him in to contribute additional lyrics to I Remember Mama.

But there were more significant musical-theatre names involved in Baker Street. The stunning sets were designed by Oliver Smith. Joshua Logan was supposed to direct the show, but when he withdrew the job was taken on by Harold Prince, who was following up his first directorial job from scratch on the superb She Loves Me. Prince was just a year away from Cabaret, which would establish him as one of the most important directors in musicals.

Making her Broadway debut as choreographer was Lee Becker Theodore, who would also go on to The Apple Tree, and who had previously worked for producer Prince when she created the role of Anybodys in West Side Story.

Baker Street was set in and around London in 1897, the year in which England celebrated the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria. In the plot, Holmes is asked to retrieve letters written to and subsequently stolen from an American actress named Irene Adler. Irene becomes Holmes' accomplice in an attempt to foil the efforts of Holmes' arch enemy, Professor Moriarty, who hopes to steal the jubilee jewels during the celebration.

The principal performers were pretty much ideal for their roles. Holmes was Fritz Weaver, a classical actor who had also enjoyed success in contemporary plays. His previous musical appearances were in All American and the Jones Beach production of Around the World in Eighty Days. Coming off a personal triumph in the '63-'64 musical 110 in the Shade was Inga Swenson, who played Irene, and who had previously been Ophelia to Weaver's Hamlet at the American Shakespeare Festival. The musical Holmes bore more than a passing resemblance to the musical Henry Higgins, and a couple of years after Baker Street, Weaver and Swenson were reunited in a City Center revival of My Fair Lady.

Moriarty was played by the distinguished actor Martin Gabel, and appearing as Doctor Watson was Peter Sallis, fresh from Prince's London staging of She Loves Me. Taking the dance roles of "the three killers" were Tommy Tune, Christopher Walken, and Avin Harum.

Prince had substantial doubts about the show, in particular the score, right from the beginning. He would later write of the experience, "It is calamitous to accept inferior material." Prince also believed that Baker Street should have been an intimate piece, rather than the extravaganza it became. He was happy, however, with one of Smith's many elaborate devices, the scene of Victoria's jubilee procession, which had Bil Baird, of marionette and Flahooley fame, creating a parade of animated wooden soldiers and a miniature coach for the Queen.

Baker Street tried out in Boston, where it received a rave review in Variety that compared it to My Fair Lady, then Toronto, home town of the songwriters. But Prince was no longer content to let things rest as they were, and so he brought in songwriters Bock and Harnick, who had, earlier the same season, triumphed with Prince's production of Fiddler on the Roof. Bock and Harnick would write four additional songs for Baker Street: "Buffalo Belle," "I'm in London Again," "Cold, Clear World," and "I Shall Miss You, Holmes." The team took no credit, with the entire score attributed in the program to Grudeff and Jessel. "Buffalo Belle" was cut prior to Broadway, but, during the Broadway run, it was reinstated as a replacement for "I'm in London Again."

Meanwhile, Cohen launched an enormous publicity campaign for Broadway, including a vast front-of-house mechanical sign depicting an attempted crime. The result was enormous anticipation and a significant advance sale. At a cost of $600,000, Baker Street arrived at the Broadway Theatre on February 16, 1965, and received reviews ranging from cheers to disappointment. There was particular criticism of the attempt to suggest romantic feelings between Holmes and Adler.

The one element of the show that won unanimous approval was Smith's set design, and Smith went on to win the show's only Tony Award. Also nominated: Swenson, Coopersmith, and costume designer Motley. Baker Street moved in November, 1965 to the Martin Beck Theatre, which, according to Coopersmith, suited the show better than had the larger Broadway. Conan Doyle's hero would have greater theatrical success when he came back to Broadway in 1974, in a Royal Shakespeare Company revival of William Gillette's play Sherlock Holmes. In 1989 at the Cambridge Theatre, London saw a short-lived new musical called Sherlock Holmes, co-starring Ron Moody and Liz Robertson and entirely the work of Leslie Bricusse.

MGM's cast recording of Baker Street has never been on CD before, and by finally putting it out, Decca Broadway has restored to the catalogue a worthy title. And the sound is considerably improved from that on the old LP. But Baker Street's score, while consistently pleasant, is also somewhat underpowered. As one who saw the show at a Saturday matinee preview, I can attest that Baker Street was an enjoyable show to sit through. But on disc, it's only moderately entertaining.

Best are the quartet for Holmes, Adler, and their assistants, "What a Night This Is Going to Be"; Swenson's "I'm in London Again" and "I'd Do It Again"; and Sallis' wistful "A Married Man." Swenson's singing is just lovely, making one wish she had done more Broadway musicals after 110 and Baker Street.

As CD bonuses, Decca Broadway has included a cover version of "A Married Man" recorded by no less than Richard Burton, who had starred in Cohen's recent Broadway production of Hamlet. While we know from Camelot that Burton had a modest but appealing singing voice, he speaks the entire song here. The other bonus track is an instrumental, "Baker Street Mystery," which offers a bit of the music from the "London Underground" ballet.