Photo Credit: Paul Ruffolo
Talented director Marcella Kearns works with an equally talented cast in Milwaukee Chamber Theatre’s season-opening production of Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Jersey Lily. Kay Allmand summons the warmth of beauty and simple mystery to the role of famed actress Lillie Langtry. She is being blackmailed by a mysterious figure who has stolen love letters exchanged between her and an heir to the throne years in the past. Distraught, she turns to her good friend Oscar Wilde (a sharply witty Rick Pendzich) who contacts the only person who could possibly help Langtry: the legendary detective Sherlock Holmes. Holmes is played with soulful precision by Brian J. Gill. The central trio of Gill, Pendzich and Allmand mix a dynamic which deftly carries some of the livelier moments in the plot.
Holmes is aided in the case by a charismatically compassionate Ryan Schabach as Dr. Watson. A terrifyingly poised Matt Daniels reaches into the more overpowering end of his energies to render Holme’s great antagonist Professor Moriarty. Daniels has a cool, menacing passion in the role of a man with little regard for human life. Milwaukee theater veteran Karen Estrada and relative newcomer Jesse Bhamrah give life to the edges of the plot as a couple of Moriarty’s associates who suffer their own conflicts. Though there may be moments that feel a bit drawn-out here and there, Kearns and company keep the pacing quite brisk from beginning to end. Two hours of intrigue glide by fluidly in spite of a few notable lapses in the action.
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Through Aug. 26 at the Broadway Theatre Center’s Cabot Theatre, 158 N. Broadway. For tickets, call 414-291-7800 or visit milwaukeechambertheatre.com.
