American "Sherlock" in the works in The World of Sherlock Holmes Forum

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American "Sherlock" in the works

Author	Comment
Phantom Stranger	American "Sherlock" in the works	Lead	[-]
Jan 25 12 12:43 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	This sounds like a bad idea: http://blastr.com/2012/01...o-elementary-bbc-she.php
MacXoftheMounted		#1	[-]
Jan 25 12 12:17 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Oh, boy. Can't wait for the British Gunsmoke either. MacXoftheMounted.....................formerly known as Professor Von X
VideoCellar		#2	[-]
Jan 26 12 6:25 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	If CBS stays away from the actual characterisations of the BBC series, there would be litle room for the BBC producers to fight the US series. The concept of "modernisation" of Sherlock Holmes stories had been the rule for a long time in cinema and CBS owns that certain dozen very influential modernised Sherlock Holmes films from the 1940s. Add their 1980's pilot "Return of Sherlock Holmes" and CBS is on really solid ground. I agree the American series probably wouldn't stand up to the quality over quantity of the BBC series, but you can't copyright ideas. Especially, ideas that other people had 80, 90, 100 years ago. This was inevitably going to happen. Shane Sullivan The Video Cellar Last Edited By: VideoCellar Jan 26 12 6:42 PM. Edited 1 times.
drmedula		#3	[-]
Feb 14 12 3:18 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	YEP, they're serious: http://www.deadline.com/2...in-cbs-pilot-elementary/
Rick		#4	[-]
Feb 14 12 10:40 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Curious. With Jonny Lee Miller in the American Sherlock, and Benedict Cumberbatch in the British, we have both halves of the National Theatre's Monster/Creator cast from last year's FRANKENSTEIN.
starhawk60.movieserialmess...		#5	[-]
Feb 15 12 12:24 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	We'll all find out soon enough if he has the acting chops for the genre when he is seen as Roger Collins in Tim Burton's update of Dark Shadows. As a long time Holmes devotee, I'll keep an open mind and watch the 1st episode.
starhawk60.movieserialmess...		#6	[-]
Feb 28 12 10:47 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Well gang the producers of the American show have picked someone to fill the role of Dr. Watson to Johnny Lee Miller's Holmes and it's.. Lucy Liu?!? Don't get me wrong, she is a very good actress as evidenced by her co-starring on the great cop show Southland, but this is too big a leap of faith. Read it all here: http://insidetv.ew.com/20...lock-holmes-based-pilot/
SiBurning		#7	[-]
Feb 28 12 11:27 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I'm sitting here watching a rerun of The Green Hornet, and now you tell me Watson will be Kung Fu Panda. Guide to Resources on CHFB
drmedula		#8	[-]
Feb 28 12 11:32 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	[now you tell me Watson will be Kung Fu Panda.] Actually, that would be Jack Black... but now I'm gonna think of him as the modern-day Nigel Bruce.
SiBurning		#9	[-]
Feb 28 12 11:44 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Po, Viper... I never watched it. Just put on the trailer and saw that Lucy's a snake. Guide to Resources on CHFB
Wich2		#10	[-]
Feb 28 12 11:45 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Miller's a good actor; but this premise seems fraught with peril. Though actually, female Watson characters are not new: Woodward in THEY MIGHT BE GIANTS, Colin in RETURN OF SHERLOCK HOLMES. But if you take out the period, the place, and the original relationship, what's left? A fast detective, and a slower assistant - which has been done a jillion times. We'll see...
SiBurning		#11	[-]
Feb 28 12 11:56 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I always felt that the strength of Holmes was the fanatical reliance on observation and inference without needing extraneous information. In many of the stories, he's pretty much in the dark about what happened and who the players are, and has to ask for the story after solving the case. So the change of setting doesn't bother me as much as when Holmes has some clue about normal human emotions and desires... Or sports or politics or... Compare that to Miss Marple, say, whose entirely based on understanding people and their surroundings. Yup! We'll see... Guide to Resources on CHFB Last Edited By: SiBurning Feb 28 12 12:08 PM. Edited 2 times.
Phantom Stranger		#12	[-]
Mar 9 12 7:13 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	This is getting to be REALLY strange: http://blog.zap2it.com/fr...-cbs-its-elementary.html
Servant of Legendre		#13	[-]
Mar 10 12 6:48 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	And Michael Clarke Duncan as Professor Moriarty... Hey, it could happen.
BijouBob8mm		#14	[-]
Mar 13 12 4:27 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Add their 1980's pilot "Return of Sherlock Holmes" and CBS is on really solid ground. I'd think those past efforts could possibly work against them, given how long ago they last tried and considering how unsuccessful both attempts were. Rewatching the (deservedly) unsold 1987 pilot THE RETURN OF SHERLOCK HOLMES makes it clear that CBS was completely clueless about how to handle a contemporary Sherlock Holmes. (Strike one!) A few years later, an older but no wiser CBS dusted off pretty much the same basic premise and tried again with 1993's SHERLOCK HOLMES RETURNS. (Strike two!!) Both of these films had Holmes thawed out from cryogenic sleep and relocated to America with a female assistant. (And the casting of Lucy Liu as their latest Holmes' new assistant shows the network still hasn't learned their lesson.) Their repetitive past track record at attempting to update the detective decades earlier, coupled with the fact that CBS actually approached the BBC about such a venture, makes it clear this new show is more imitation than innovation. Last Edited By: BijouBob8mm Mar 13 12 4:30 PM. Edited 2 times.
VideoCellar		#15	[-]
Mar 13 12 8:45 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	BijouBob8mm wrote: coupled with the fact that CBS actually approached the BBC about such a venture, makes it clear this new show is more imitation than innovation. I suppose that is the problem with working with the public domain and properties with non-exclusive rights attached. Any BBC person who went into a meeting with CBS without the understanding that they were going to go ahead with a Sherlock Holmes project with or without them was pretty naive. Sherlock may have its own unique elements but it is far from an entirely original work. It is both a derivative work of the original stories and the hundreds of other examples of a modernised Holmes. Some of its innovations are original, innovative and copyrightable - "The Science of Deduction blog", Holmes' thoughts textually displayed on screen, "Sherlock" and "John" rather that "Holmes" and "Watson", possible nicotine patches, new characters, story names and changes and obviously the scripts, direction, finished films, etc. Others aren't copyrightable - texting is too generic and real world, use of other technology such as computers and modern scientific equipment again is generic, real world and has been done in Sherlock Holmes adaptations before "Sherlock" (and use of technology exists in the original stories). What I was really getting at was, short of wholesale lifting of the actually copyright aspects of "Sherlock", CBS would be in a position, (by owning the rights to the Universal film series, the "Return" pilots and the previous, unproduced Elementary scripts they have accumulated over the last while) to easily have any attempt at an injunction to stop the production of the series summarily dismissed if solely on the grounds of been there, done that. Shane Sullivan The Video Cellar
BijouBob8mm		#16	[-]
Mar 14 12 9:04 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I suppose that is the problem with working with the public domain and properties with non-exclusive rights Do we know how public domain Sherlock Holmes is? I remember talking several years ago with actor Daniel Davis, who played Professor Moriarty on a couple of episodes of STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION. He said Paramount had assumed that Holmes and all the other characters from the tales were public domain, and were already at work on the first Moriarty episode when they learned that the Conan Doyle estate actually maintained and owned the rights. The studio's legal department quickly contacted the appropriate people and were given the go-ahead. Is this still the case? Have some of the tales slipped into public domain or, ala Edgar Rice Burroughs' estate and Tarzan, has the Doyle estate kept control? (I know a few Sherlock Holmes books that have come out bear the imprint that they were done with the authorization of the Doyle family.)
Wich2		#17	[-]
Mar 14 12 12:34 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	The Holmes rights case is a mess, and I highly doubt that CBS had the right to stop the Beeb. Our first Quicksilver show was done by the permission of Dame Jean Conan Doyle, and our second with her Estate's; since then, Sheldon Reynold's widow has made life difficult for folks - even though it appears her claim is bogus.
BijouBob8mm		#18	[-]
Mar 14 12 1:36 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I must have missed a chapter, Craig. How did Sheldon Reynolds and/or his widow come into the picture? I thought Dame Jean's estate still was active.
Wich2		#19	[-]
Mar 14 12 5:08 PM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	It sorta is, Bob... But Reynolds' widow tries to shake people down (including a theater that was using one of my scripts) with the rights from their old TV series's.
VideoCellar		#20	[-]
Mar 15 12 1:31 AM Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Every original Doyle story up to and including "Thor Bridge" is in the public domain in the US. The remaining 10 or so stories are in copyright in the US (and US only). Arthur Conan Doyle's copyrights lapsed in the UK in 1981, were maybe reinstated in 1995 and, if so, lapsed again in 2001. Any and all countries that adopt a rule of the shorter term (or term comparison) apply either their own copyright term or the British copyright term, whichever is shorter, to the works. So for the vast majority of the world (only a handful of small, non-Berne or UCC countries have no ROTST) the rights to the entire canon have lapsed. It has often been argued that all attempts to seek payment for US rights in the remaining 10 copyright stories for pastiches on the assumption that some Sherlock Holmes stories are in copyright therefore "Sherlock Holmes" and related characters are in copyright are tenuous at best. The two estates that represent the works have both been repeatedly denied trademark and other extra-copyright protection on the properties and have lost legal action attempting to prevent people from using the Sherlock Holmes property. The two rival estates stem from the messy rights situation that Doyle left his estate in. His wife and children, who did not get along, received equal shares in his literary estate. When this happens each co-owner of the copyright has the power to license the right to use the property and the other co-owners have no rights or power to interfere with the others' license arrangements. Dame Jean's Estate and The Reynolds/Plunkett Estate claim a 50 percent share in the literary estate, but deny each others right to the property. Dame Jean's inherited her brother Adrian's who had inherited his mother's share. Plunkett's share was won in a divorce settlement from her former husband Sheldon Reynold who purchased the remaining shares of the estate, from the other children Dennis and Mary, before producing the 1954-55 TV series (which itself is in the public domain). This is where the problem lies for the BBC. Even if Sherlock Holmes is not public domain, per se, they do not have exclusive rights to exploit the character. The estates run a non-exclusive licensing regime where they will effectively license the property to anyone who comes along with the scheduled fee because this is their main income stream since the copyrights in the works lapsed. Without an exclusive license the BBC can only claim infringement of their unique work, which I am sure CBS will be extremely careful to avoid infringing, if simply because they do not have to infringe it to make a viable program. Shane Sullivan The Video Cellar

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American "Sherlock" in the works

American "Sherlock" in the works