CBS announced they will be race swapping Dr. John Watson with actor Morris Chestnut in an upcoming adaptation of Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes.
Illustration of the Sherlock Holmes adventure The Greek Interpreter, which appeared in The Strand Magazine in September, 1893. Original caption was “HOLMES PULLED OUT HIS WATCH.” Photo Credit: Sidney Paget, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
In a press release, CBS detailed the adaptation titled Watson will follow Chestnut’s Dr. John Watson as he solves medical mysteries in a modern setting while also dealing with the fallout of the death of Sherlock Holmes at the hands of his nemesis Moriarty.
The official logline states, “In WATSON, a year after the death of his friend and partner Sherlock Holmes at the hands of Moriarty, Dr. John Watson (Chestnut) resumes his medical career as the head of a clinic dedicated to treating rare disorders. Watson’s old life isn’t done with him, though—Moriarty and Watson are set to write their own chapter of a story that has fascinated audiences for more than a century.”
It adds, “WATSON is a medical show with a strong investigative spine, featuring a modern version of one of history’s greatest detectives as he turns his attention from solving crimes to solving medical mysteries.”
Morris Chestnut. Photo Credit: Diondre Jones
The series will be showrun by Craig Sweeny. Sweeny and Chestnut are also executive producing alongside Aaron Kaplan, Brian Morewitz, and Dr. Shäron Moalem.
Larry Teng will executive produce and direct the first episode. The show received a straight to series order.
CBS Entertainment president Amy Reisenbach gushed about the show stating, “We are thrilled to feature such a beloved character from the world of Sherlock Holmes at the center of this series and have it brought to life by Morris Chestnut in a fresh and unexpected take on the immortal doctor.”
She added, “[Showrunner] Craig Sweeny’s bold new vision for the complex Dr. Watson deftly interweaves rich character storytelling with edge-of-your-seat medical mysteries.”
A mock up of Morris Chestnut as Dr. John Watson
In Conan Arthur Doyle’s The Adventure of Charles Augustus Milverton he describes a criminal, “He was a middle-sized, strongly built man – square jaw, thick neck, moustache, a mask over his eyes.”
Upon hearing this description, Sherlock Holmes retorts, “That’s rather vague… Why, it might be a description of Watson!” An inspector replies to Holmes, “It’s true… It might be a description of Watson.”
In an illustration by Sidney Paget in The Strand Magazine as part of The Adventure of the Musgrave Ritual, Watson was clearly depicted as a white British man.
An illustration of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. John Watson in The Strand Magazine in 1893
What do you make of CBS race swapping Dr. John Watson for their upcoming TV series, Watson?
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