The Shoals chapter of the Baker Street Irregulars, the American society of Sherlock Holmes enthusiasts, will meet at 2 p.m. Sunday, March 28, in the conference room of the Florence-Lauderdale Public Library, 350 N. Wood Ave., downtown Florence.
The Disreputable Little Scarecrows – the Shoals scion society of the BSI – will discuss Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s original Holmes adventure, “The Five Orange Pips” (first published in the November 1891 edition in London’s Strand magazine), and view the World War II-era Holmes film THE HOUSE OF FEAR.
Directed by Roy William Neill (THE BLACK ROOM, THE SCARLET CLAW, FRANKENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLF MAN), THE HOUSE OF FEAR stars Basil Rathbone (as the brilliant British detective) and Nigel Bruce (as his loyal friend and companion Dr. Watson) in a loose but effectively eerie and sinister adaptation of Doyle’s tale of “The Five Orange Pips.”
The film’s storyline sends Holmes and Watson to an ancient mansion in Scotland, where they investigate a series of murders involving an exclusive gentlemen’s society known as the Good Comrades Club.
In addition to Rathbone and Bruce, the atmospheric black-and-white mystery of THE HOUS OF FEAR also features familiar Hollywood character actors Dennis Hoey (as Inspector Lestrade of Scotland Yard), Aubrey Mather, Paul Cavanagh, Holmes Herbert and Gavin Muir.
BSI gatherings are free and open to the public. New members and visitors are welcome. For details, call (256) 366-4512 or e-mail pillaroffire@bellsouth.net.
“There’s intelligence behind this business, Watson. Cold, calculating, ruthless intelligence.” – Sherlock Holmes (Basil Rathbone) in Roy William Neill’s THE HOUSE OF FEAR (1945)
Original Post