Hurrah! The glorious and tuneful cast of Sherlock Holmes and the Sound of the Baskervilles has been announced!
The Cast
Mr. Sherlock Holmes – Philip Scott
Dr. John Watson – Gareth Smith
Miss Jane Marple – Katie Taffler
PC. Cuthbert Lestrade – Sarah Browncross
Mr. Frederick Baskerville – Tim L
Miss Mabel Lecreuset – Clemency Cooper
Lady Voluptua Baskerville – Antonia Custance Baker
Mr. Casper Baskerville – Sam Swinnerton
Miss Bellatrix Baskerville – Hannah ‘Fitzy’ Walker
The Shadowy Figures Commanding Their Every Move
Director – Ros Higman
Assistant Director – Harry Ullman
Musical Director – Sam Swinnerton
Stage Manager / Writer – Carrie Chambers
The Man in Black – Richard Owen
Choreography – Gareth Smith
Publicity – Clemency Cooper
Artistic Directors – C Howdle and Ben Parker
The Details…(in alphabetical order)
Sarah Browncross – PC Cuthbert Lestrade
Sarah Browncross is an Edinburgh virgin, having only discovered Light Entertainment in the final year of her Oxford degree. Baskervilles will be her fourth show, and the fourth time she has been cast as a character who is neither female nor sane. Choosing to ignore this fairly blatant hinting, she has selected her postgraduate destination based on “ooh! They have a Light Entertainment Society!” and hopes to continue being typecast for years to come.
Antonia Custance Baker – Lady Voluptua Baskerville
Antonia Custance Baker joined the Light Entertainment Society in 2003 when her parent’s threatened to cut off her gin allowance if she didn’t take up some extra curricula activity.
Since then she has played 12 dumb blondes and 5 villainesses as well as taking on roles of producer and wardrobe mistress. After taking two years out to annoy elephants in Africa she returned to a welcome home ball which put to end any final hopes that she could escape her destiny as part of this beloved drama group and is now a full time senior member/matriarch. This is her fifth Edinburgh show and the first time she appears fully dressed and not seducing anyone.
Carrie Chambers – Writer / Stage Manager
Carrie oozed into the Light Entertainment Society nearly four years ago, when she was very young and naive and pliable. Over time she found that the light entertainment society began to ooze back into her, until she was not sure where one ended and the other began. Now she interdigitates with it like a sticklebrick, happy in the knowledge that she couldn’t leave it if she tried. When she is not interdigitating with light entertainers she is found adhering to vets, whom she follows around with unrewarded devotion. When she grows up she will have vet students adhering to her.
Clemency Cooper – Miss Mabel Lecreuset / Publicity
Clem Cooper stumbled across Light Entertainment four years ago and has since produced, performed and assembled an atrocious array of accents in numerous shows. Amongst her publicity duties of serving tea and cake to the masses, singing and flyering on the Mile and liaising with cast and venue during the last Fringe, Clem also performed as Pinocchio in “Once Upon A Time”. When not organising a production company Clem is usually found herding hordes of school children and finds the logistics of these two occupations remarkably similar.
Ros Higman – Director
Ros is ANCIENT, having gone up to the Fringe with Two Shades every single year of her four-year languages degree at Cambridge, and should really bugger off and let someone else have a go. But it’s too much fun, so she won’t. Besides, nobody else wanted to direct, so she feels a bit better about it. Previous experience includes directing another of Carrie’s plays, a version of Jack and the Beanstalk in which the beanstalk was anthropomorphic, the cow was extendable, and the giant was Alan Titchmarsh. She therefore feels very well placed to cope with the relative sanity of Sound of the Baskervilles.
Richard Owen – Head Technician
Richard was at Oxford for 4 years and did too much theatre. Not only has he meddled with lighting design and production management, he also managed to co-found TAFF, the society for Oxford University theatre Technicians and Designers. So far he’s been the Technical Director for all of TSoB’s jaunts to Edinburgh and has enjoyed every one! He has started to dabble with Directing, having directed both “The Matrix: The Pantomime” and “Back to the Future: The Pantomime” at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. In his spare time, he tries to hold down a job vaguely related to engineering and enjoys writing about himself in the third person.
Gareth Smith – Dr. John Watson
One Saturday many years ago, Gareth woke up during the uncivilised hours before noon. The reason he woke up was that his phone was ringing, and when he made it stop ringing, it spoke with the voice of a friend:
“Gareth! Do you want to be in a play?”
“Uh… Yeah, sure….”
“Excellent! I’ve emailed you the script, see if you can get to my
house before lunch. We’ll be performing tomorrow morning.”Gareth is now growing a moustache.
Katie Taffler – Miss Marple
Miss Marple first tracked down TSOB last year as an innocent and unsuspecting classics student at Cambridge University, however once given the role of Julia in ‘1984: A Comedy’ in the 2009 Fringe Festival she found that despite her best efforts she was unable to stay away for long. When she is not solving (or committing) a crime, Miss Marple delights in fooling the public in her double life as a disguised student who goes under the pseudonym Katie Taffler. So succesful has this con been that miss marple has had the pleasure of being awarded several pricipal Universtiy roles, including ‘Dulcie’ in ‘The Boy Friend’, ‘Elise’ in ‘L’Avare’, ‘Baby June’ in ‘Gypsy’ and Olga in Gilbert and Sulivan’s ‘The Grand Duke’.
Harry Ullman – Assistant Director
Harry has been involved with light entertainment in various forms for 8 years now, first finding the Oxford University Light Entertainment Society as an undergrad before founding the University of Sheffield Light Entertainment Society as a postgrad. This is his second show with Two Shades of Blue, having performed last year in “Once Upon a Time”. Harry was also previously involved in heavy entertainment, and has extensive experience as an actor, theatre manager, producer, production manager and lighting designer. In the real world Harry is a mathematician, hence as well as assistant directing he also serves as the company Comptroller.
Hannah ‘Fitzy’ Walker – Miss Bellatrix Baskerville
Hannah has, since joining the Cambridge branch of Light Entertainment 3 years ago: – Become known almost exclusively as Fitzy (for reasons that still slightly bemuse) – Never missed a CULES performance (acting, writing, producing, directing, costuming, heckling) – Drunk a fair amount more than her body’s weight in gin (though never yet all at once) – Constructed a large pantomime dragon for under £10 (which was mostly spent on bamboo and velcro) – Spent rather large portion of time in the Costume Attic (and has become so attached she plans to live under it next year).
These last two, plus her natural tendency to find odd things in charity shops, are probably why she’s also aiding with costume and props for Baskervilles, making this her second year at the Fringe with Two Shades. She relishes the opportunity to add slightly sinister twin to her current role list of wicked witch, toga-clad seducer, optimistic sun, sarcastic cat, bit-part pirate and heroic space-captain.