Pitlochry Festival Theatre hosts premiere of new Sherlock Holmes adaptation
Pitlochry Festival Theatre’s Amphitheatre is to host the premiere of a new adaptation of Sherlock Holmes book A Study in Scarlet.
Based on the novel by Arthur Conan Doyle, Sherlock Holmes: A Study in Lipstick, Ketchup and Blood is written by Lesley Hart
Performed in Pitlochry Festival Theatre’s outdoor Amphitheatre nestled in the Theatre’s Explorers Garden, Sherlock Holmes: A Study in Lipstick, Ketchup and Blood will première from 8 June – 11 July.
Sherlock Holmes: A Study in Lipstick, Ketchup and Blood cast will feature Tom Richardson (The Prince and the Pauper, New Vic Theatre) as Ash and Deirdre Davis (Eileen Donachie in River City, BBC Scotland, and the films Orphans and Get Duked) as Harry.
The production will be directed by Marc Small with set and costume design by Elizabeth Newman, movement by Lesley Hutchison, lighting design by Jeanine Byrne and sound design by Matthew Tomlinson.
In a blasted world, two survivors – a doctor and an actor – pass the time by staging their favourite story salvaged from the flames: A Study in Scarlet, the origin story of Sherlock Holmes. But when tensions arise around casting, more than dead bodies start to surface…
For more information and tickets, visit pitlochryfestivaltheatre.com
Playwright Lesley Hart said: “Sherlock Holmes stories set exquisite puzzles and resolve them in an entirely logical fashion. This is one of the things that gives them their enduring appeal, that we crave as humans – perhaps more so when logic fails us elsewhere. One of the things that appeals to me most about adapting A Study in Scarlet for Pitlochry Festival Theatre is the puzzle of taking this classic detective novel – which introduces two of the most iconic characters in literature, Holmes and Watson – and trying to reimagine it for a purely theatrical space, outdoors, unplugged, with only two actors and an hour to play with.
“As a stage adaptation, I want it to be rooted in the novel and its time, but also to speak vividly to a contemporary theatre audience; to honour Conan-Doyle’s characters and story but illuminate them afresh; to embrace Holmesian logic whilst asking urgent questions that logic can’t resolve: what does justice mean? What is human life worth? How should we live in this world? How should we live with each other? What power is there in stories? And in puzzling all this out, I hope to deliver a show that appeals to Holmes fans, Holmes novices, and anyone in between.
“The new adaptation will focus on the forging of Holmes and Watson’s partnership via this first joint murder investigation – and on injecting as much drama and theatricality into it all as possible. On every level this adaptation is a story of two friends striking out together – of partnership, codependency and the science and art of survival.”
