News has just broken that the actor, Douglas Wilmer has died today.
Another loss. Wilmer was mainly associated by the public for his role as
Sherlock Holmes, which he first played in the BBC's 1964 production of
The Speckled Band. Together with co-star Nigel Stock, playing Doctor
Watson, it was a knock out tv series, that Peter Cushing went on to star
in after Wilmer left.
In 1973 Wilmer played author Jacques Futrelle's Holmesian detective Professor Van Dusen in The Rivals of
Sherlock Holmes for ITV. In 1975 he once again appeared as Holmes
(albeit in a supporting role) in Gene Wilder's The Adventure of Sherlock
Holmes' Smarter Brother, with Thorley Walters as Dr. Watson. Wilmer
also played Sir Denis Nayland Smith in two Harry Alan Towers' Fu Manchu
films The Brides of Fu Manchu (1966) and The Vengeance of Fu Manchu
(1967).
Douglas Wilmer
appeared in Hammer films, The Vampire Lovers, as Baron Hartog... with
Peter Cushing in 1970. With roles in Revenge of the Pink Panther, The
Golden Voyage of Sinbad, Cleopatra in 1963 and Jason and the Argonauts..
it will be for Sherlock Holmes he will probably be best remembered. In
2009 Wilmer published his autobiography entitled Stage Whispers. In 2012
Wilmer made a cameo appearance in the "The Reichenbach Fall" episode of
Sherlock as an irate old man in The Diogenes Club.
