Where was 221B Baker Street? It has been a much-debated and much investigated. In Doyle and Holmes' lifetime, the question was already being asked by tourists to London.... and film-makers. When Stoll Pictures began the creation of their Sherlock silent films starring Eille Norwood in 1920, they needed to identify where to film on Baker Street!
Kinematograph Weekly - Thursday 16 December 1920
A Missing Address.
Everyone knows that the immortal Sherlock Holmes lived in Baker Street. The fact is mentioned in most of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's stories of the great detective's adventures, and most of the problems Sherlock solves are brought to the Baker Street rooms by the people they most affect. In short, Sherlock Holmes and Baker Street are almost as closely associated in the public mind as Sherlock Homes and his none too brilliant Boswell, Dr. Watson Now to the readers of these famous stories the exact location of the house in Baker Street is of but little importance. They may feel a mild curiosity on the subject, but certainly nothing more. To Maurice Elvey, who is now filming the big Stoll series of "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes," in fifteen episodes, the case is very different. For picture purposes an imaginary place has to become a real one, and it is absolutely essential that Holmes's house in Baker Street shall figure on the screen. Within the next fortnight; Mr. Elvey must take scenes upon the doorstep and in the doorway, and the problem which is baffling both the producer and Sherlock Holmes himself (in the person of Eille Norwood) is this : Which is the doorstep? Which is the doorway? Residents in Baker Street who have any reason to suppose that they are living in the house Sir Arthur Conan Doyle had in mind when he selected the detective's address have been asked to solve this knotty problem by writing to Maurice Elvey, and indicate their readiness to allow their premises to be used, immortalised on the screen.
The Bioscope - Thursday 16 December 1920
Everyone knows that the immortal Sherlock Holmes lived in Baker Street, but to readers of these famous stories the exact location of the house in Baker Street is of but little importance. They may feel mildly curious on the subject, but certainly nothing more. To Maurice Elvey, who is now filming the big Stoll series, of "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes" in fifteen episodes, however, the case is different. For picture purposes an imaginary place has to become a real one, and it is absolutely essential that Holmes's house in Baker Street shall figure on the screen. Within the next fortnight Mr. Elvey must take scenes upon the doorstep and in the doorway. Here is a chance tor residents in Baker Street who have any reason to suppose that they are living in the house Sir Arthur Conan Doyle had in mind when he selected the detective's address. They can help to solve this knotty problem by writing to Maurice Elvey without delay—especially if they will at the same time indicate their readiness to allow their premises to be immortalised on the pictures. Not that Mr. Elvey wishes for one moment to suggest that he has any professional axe to grind, but that he is willing to stimulate the interest the public takes in increasing measure in film production.
The interior scenes for the films were created at the Stoll film studios outside London:
Kinematograph Weekly - Thursday 06 January 1921
Concerning sets.
Three days before Christmas there were eighteen different sets standing in the Stoll studios at Cricklewood - twelve on the main floor and six on the "deck" floor, which extends over the property room and the generating plant. Four of these sets had been struck by Christmas Eve, but two others had taken their place, but two others had taken their place, and there will be an average of fifteen sets in the studio for some time to come. It is very doubtful whether any other studio in the country could establish such a record, but Stoll thinks nothing of breaking records now that it has a super-studio in which to do it. Harold Shaw, who is producing the screen version of E. Phillips Oppenheim's famous novel, "False Evidence," has recently completed 230 scenes, in twenty sets, in the space of eight and a half days. And Martin Thornton talks of twenty-five scenes as a perfectly ordinary day's work. Most of the sets on the "deck " floor are for the big Stoll series (fifteen episodes) of "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes," and they will probably remain where they are for quite a while. For they represent the famous detective's rooms in Baker Street, together with staircases and landings, and they will be needed in most of the episodes. These sets have been most ingeniously contrived by Walter W. Murton, the art director, and R. Swann, the master carpenter. Except for their unfinished tope they might be a portion of a Baker Street house transplanted to the studio, for the rooms really open out of one another, as rooms should do. Each room has one wall missing, but otherwise the realism is wonderful.
The 'Kinematograph Weekly' joined the dots nicely in shooting Baker Street from the outside, and the sitting room on a set....
Kinematograph Weekly - Thursday 06 January 1921
Even a big film serial like "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes" has its little ironies. Sherlock Holmes' rooms are now conveniently situated in the Stoll Studio at Cricklewood, but the great detective needs a front door in Baker Street in order to get in an out of them.
The answer to which house was selected by Stoll was not published in newspapers, but as the movies are restored and released we should be able to determine which house was selected. Some wide shots of the street were regularly used, such as this shot in 'The Sign of Four' (1923):
Burnley News - Saturday 22 January 1921
Although the fact is not yet generally known, Maurice Elvey has already taken a considerable number scenes Baker-street for the big Stoll series adapted from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's famous stories "The Adventures Sherlock Holmes."
Most these scenes have been filmed through the window of a solicitor's office which happens to be situated very conveniently on the ground floor of a building opposite the house which it has been decided that Sherlock had his rooms. From this window the King of Bohemia has been seen to drive to Sherlock's residence in a car and to descend from it; Grant Munro, the client who figures conspicuously in the "Adventure the Yellow Face" (played most convincingly that popular actor, Clifford Heatherley), has been seen to arrive in a taxi, knock the door, and be admitted by the housekeeper (Madame D'Esterre), and to depart in another taxi with the redoubtable detective and his faithful henchman, Dr. Watson (Herbert Willis). And ail sorts other characters, doubtful and respectful alike, have been "shot" on the pavement arid the doorstep with the sheltering aid of the law.
A variety scenes have been taken in the street itself, moreover, but Mr. Elvey confesses that it is neither easy nor pleasant to film in such a thoroughfare.
How many solicitor offices were on ground floors of Baker street in 1921?
There were Messrs T. RICHARDS & Co., 109 Baker-street (Portman Square), and this firm were operating at that address into the 1960s!
Ultimately, filming on Baker Street proved to be impractical, and the outside and inside of 221B Baker Street were brought together at the film studies - as this beautiful photo attests:
Illustrated London News - Saturday 06 August 1921
BAKER STREET IN A STUDIO: A REMARKABLE SET
A “SHELL” OF SHERLOCK HOLMES’S CHAMBERS: AN EPISODE UNDER THE RAYS OF AN ARC LAMP, FOR THE CINEMATOGRAPH.
When the Stoll Company began the film of “The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes,” the producer at first attempted to take some of the scenes on the actual spot in Baker Street, but without success, and subsequently a marvellous reproduction was built in a portion of the studios at Cricklewood. Our illustration shows one of the fifteen episodes of the film, in which Mr. Eille Norwood plays the part of Sherlock Holmes, being acted beneath the rays of a big special arc lamp designed to give a night effect to the scene. Above can be seen the mercury vapour tubes of the special lights which are a feature of all cinematograph studios.
Other specific filming locations were needed. For example, for 'A Scandal in Bohemia' as filmed required a theatre scene.
The Bioscope - Thursday 21 October 1920
For one of the scenes in one of the fifteen two-reel episodes of Stoll's big serial, "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes," a large theatre crowded with people is essential ; and Maurice Elvey has been wondering how to secure such a scene without hiring a theatre specially for the brief occasion, or securing (if such a thing be possible) the permission of a theatrical manager to interrupt the performance of some actual play.
"The theatre I need," says Mr. Elvey, "is one about the size of the Alhambra. Would it not be possible, then, to have the camera, the players, the necessary high-power lamps and all the other accessories, ready and waiting at some forthcoming Trade Show in that building, and to enact and take the necessary scenes immediately after the Trade Show is over and before the people in the auditorium have departed?"
Kinematograph Weekly - Thursday 16 December 1920
A Theatrical Notion. For the filming of " A Scandal in Bohemia," which is the first episode in the big Stoll series adapted from Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's famous stories of "The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes," a theatre is necessary. Some of the most striking incidents in this particular " adventure " take place upon the stage of a West-End playhouse, and Maurice Elvey, who is producing the whole series for Stoll's, is hoping to secure the use of a real theatre in the West-End and to engage the services of a real audience, after the regular performance is over. More, probably, will be heard during the next week or so of the scheme which has been evolved, but at the moment it would be injudicious to describe that scheme in detail.
A solution was indeed found, and the scenes were filmed in front of a live theatre audience. 'Bioscope' provided a particularly detailed report of a remarkable event. Oh to be in that audience, and part of the film! What is particularly confusing is that the two newspaper articles below mention two different theatres!
London Daily Chronicle - Wednesday 22 December 1920
PLAYGOERS AS PLAYERSWHOLE THEATRE AUDIENCE IN A CINEMA PLOT.
A matinee audience at the Ambassadors Theatre yesterday enjoyed two separate performances, themselves taking part in one of the shows—as supers.
When the curtain had fallen upon “The White-Headed Boy,” some scenes from the forthcoming Stoll film production of “The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes " were screened at the theatre, and those present were forthwith transformed from a real audience which had paid its admission money to a stage audience which had not.
"A Scandal in Bohemia" was the particular Sherlock Holmes episode which was being produced. The story is that in which Sherlock Holmes, in order to gain possession of a letter written by the King of Bohemia to a London actress, impersonates the hero of a play in which she is appearing, and chloroforms her upon the stage.
Technical details of the production were watched by all parts of the house with great interest, and a request by Mr. Maurice Elvey, the producer, that the audience should applaud "in a natural manner" was obeyed with enthusiasm.
The Bioscope - Thursday 30 December 1920
"A Scandal in Bohemia"
A Daring Innovation
Filming a Theatre Audience
The Stoll Picture Company and Mr. Maurice Elvey are to be heartily congratulated on scoring a most pronounced success the other day, when in their efforts to obtain realism they resorted to the daring innovation of filming some of the scenes of their forthcoming production, "A Scandal in Bohemia" - one of the Sherlock Holmes episodes - in a London theatre, with a real audience acting as supers.
The coup was brought off at the St. Martin's Theatre on Tuesday afternoon, when following a matinee performance the audience were invited to remain seated the while Mr. Maurice Elvey showed them how "Pictures" were made.
Readers of Sir A. Conan Doyle's delightful series of adventures of the great detective, Sherlock Holmes, will have no difficulty in remembering the occasion when Holmes was visited at his Baker Street apartments by the King of Bohemia, who explained that he was in great trouble. From his statement it appeared that before he became king he had been involved in a love affair with Irene Adler, an actress, who was threatening to expose him before the grand duchess, to whom he was now betrothed. Holmes asks what proof the woman possesses, and the king produces a photo, which would incriminate him at once. He explains that he has already made one unsuccessful attempt to recover the remaining copy from the actress, and he fears exposure greatly. Holmes promises that he will do his best to recover the proofs.
The Detective's Discovery
The detective discovers that Irene is starring in the production, "The Tragedy of Mrs. Keragon," which is in its finishing stages at the Alhambra, and, with Watson, he pays a visit to the theatre the same day. The detective takes no interest in the play until the final scene, when the hero knocks out the villain with a timid blow and comforts the heroine, Irene Adler, whilst the baffled villain raises himself on his elbow and glances with hatred at the pair.
The next day Holmes confines himself to his room and refuses to admit even Watson, who is puzzled by his behaviour. Holmes' companion is still more confounded when he receives a note from the detective requesting him to visit the Alhambra again and offer his services when a doctor is called upon. The final scene once more arrives, but this time the hero delivers a knock-out blow that has every appearance of being genuine. He then comforts the heroine, but seems to struggle with her, pressing her handkerchief close to her face, and the curtain then drops. The hero of the play appears, and, explaining to the audience that Miss Adler has been taken ill, calls for a doctor, and Watson at once volunteers. Behind the scenes he is amazed when he discovers that the hero is Sherlock Holmes himself, who instructs him to clear everyone out of Irene's dressing-room, including himself (Holmes).
The Work of the Doctor
Watson does so, and whilst he is locking the door the dresser fumbles with Irene's clothes, and produces a packet, which , she hands to Watson and exits. Irene comes to, and the doctor then also leaves. He joins Holmes outside, and in a taxi the detective explains how he had asked Geoffrey Norton, the hero of the play, to dine with him, and had drugged him and taken his place that night, having learnt the part and 'words in his room the previous day. What the packet contained was no concern of the audience at the St. Martin's Theatre, but what they saw was a very excellent rehearsal of the scene set out above and the subsequent shooting three times until performed to the satisfaction of Mr. Elvey.
It was all splendidly organised and wonderfully successful, and from the remarks one heard on leaving had greatly interested an audience which seldom, if ever, patronised the pictures. We believe that as the result of the Stoll Company's enterprise many more patrons of the cinema theatres have been made.
It would be ungenerous to conclude this notice without a word of appreciation of the excellent and valuable services rendered by Mr. B. A. Meyer and his entire staff of the St. Martin's Theatre.
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