The Rivals: Tales of Sherlock Holmes' Rival Detectives (Dramatisation)

12 BBC radio dramas of mystery and suspense

De: Edgar Allan Poe, Jacques Futrelle

Narrado por: Full Cast, James Fleet, Tim Pigott-Smith

Inspector Lestrade of Scotland Yard introduces 12 dramatised stories, featuring detectives whose abilities rival that of the great Sherlock Holmes.

Dramatised for radio by Chris Harrald, these 12 stories are written by masters of the crime and thriller genre, all contemporaries of Arthur Conan Doyle. They include:

The Murders on the Rue Morgue by Edgar Allan Poe
The Problem of Cell 13 by Jacques Futrelle
Murder By Proxy by Matthias McDonnel Bodkin
Mystery of Redstone Manor by Catherine Lousia Pirkis
The Problem of the Superfluous Finger by Jacques Futrelle
The Clue of the Silver Spoons by Robert Barr
The Intangible Clue by Anna Katherine Green
The Game Played in the Dark by Ernest Bramah

©2015 BBC Worldwide Ltd

BRITISH QUICK PACING & SUBTLE HUMOUR,

Any additional comments?

I am not in agreement with the other reviewers who gave negatives. Here we find a kind, inquisitive, sometimes humble and even cultured Lestrade, nothing like Sir Conan Doyle's description, as far as I can see. These 12 enacted, not read,episodes are each unique, with different actors for each one, and different mysteries and milieux. The humor is subtle when present, but makes for lightheartedness, a nice feeling amidst occasional gruesomeness, which thankfully does not last long. For me, it was like a box of good quality chocolates with only your favorites, missing the ones you don't like!

A nice conceit

What made the experience of listening to The Rivals: Tales of Sherlock Holmes' Rival Detectives (Dramatisation) the most enjoyable?

This is a clever format - to have LeStrade eschew praising Holmes and, instead, telling tales of working with Holme's contemporaries in adaptations of other mystery writer's stories (where Lestrade suddenly appears with folks he never appeared with before.) It's an enjoyable enough conceit and the stories are good.

Have you listened to any of the narrators’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

Tim Pigott-Smith has been a reliably enjoyable reader since Hector was a pup!

loved it

The full cast and sound effects were excellent. The stories were very good.

Good detective stories with Lestrade

If your looking for stories with only Lestrade in them. These are for you starts out with an reporter wanting stories on Sherlock Holmes but he ends up giving them stories of other detectives he worked with. Later on becomes his memoirs telling about his life as an detective. Would have like them to remain with the report coming and asking for more stories.

Overly Cutsey and Lacking Suspense

What disappointed you about The Rivals: Tales of Sherlock Holmes' Rival Detectives (Dramatisation)?

I like ham... but with a side of grits and greens.

Has The Rivals: Tales of Sherlock Holmes' Rival Detectives (Dramatisation) turned you off from other books in this genre?

The concept was good, bridging the stories using Inspector Lestrade but the execution was less then engaging and in fact the result is a total lack of sympathy for Lestrade as a character and much more appreciation for Sherlock Holmes!

Would you be willing to try another one of the narrators’s performances?

The performances were ok but the direction did not treat the material with respect going for campy humor instead.

What character would you cut from The Rivals: Tales of Sherlock Holmes' Rival Detectives (Dramatisation)?

Inspector Lestrade, as portrayed, could have been featured less and only as a way to introduce the next story.

Any additional comments?

Great idea, audio production was professional, but needed better direction.