From the double biography of Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce, Basil and Willie...

If Rathbone was the all-round athlete, seemingly as adept with a foil as a football, Bruce was the specialist. He may have played the occasional game of golf with David Niven, but it was cricket that was Bruce's sporting love. Despite the injuries he sustained in the First World War, he was still able to bat for the Hollywood Cricket Club, founded in 1932 by Sir Charles Aubrey Smith, the only Test cricketer ever to become a Hollywood fixture in motion picture history.

Neither Holmes nor Watson showed much interest in cricket, but their creator was a keen amateur sportsman. Doyle played golf and billiards and was involved in sports administration, including the Olympic Games, but his first love was cricket. At his home in Undershaw, he would invite friends and relations for an annual ‘cricket week' in August. As with Bruce and Rathbone, Arthur Conan Doyle was introduced to the sport at public school, and he even penned short stories and poems about cricket. Doyle even used cricket as a cover for meeting up with his second wife, Jean Leckie. And one of his fans, P G Wodehouse, who also used cricket as an inspiration for his work, would eventually help form the club that Bruce and Rathbone would one day become members: the Hollywood Cricket Club.

If Ronald Colman, also a member of the HCC, was its unofficial monarch, then C Aubrey Smith was its Grand Duke. Colman was one of the first Vice-Presidents, along with George Arliss, Leon Errol and P G Wodehouse. Wodehouse had played for the Authors XI but their last match had been played in 1909. On the team had been the creator of Raffles, E W Hornung, and Hornung's brother-in-law, Arthur Conan Doyle. Neither Bruce nor Rathbone played for Wodehouse's team, as Rathbone was still to embark on an acting career and Bruce only took to the stage after he had fought in the First World War. Wodehouse had also turned out for C Aubrey Smith around the time the latter played for the Actors XI and, subsequently, became lifelong friends.

The creator of Jeeves and Wooster took the minutes at the inaugural meeting of the Hollywood Cricket Club and even offered to supply equipment. C Aubrey Smith was elected President. With its close affiliations to the film industry, most of the early members were linked, directly or indirectly, to the business, and that included Herbert Marshall, Alan Mowbray, Reginald Owen, with Bruce joining a little later. Another actor to join was Boris Karloff.

Karloff, still a struggling actor, yet to essay his role as the Monster in James Whale's version of the gothic horror classic, was the son of a diplomat in the Indian Civil Service. In common with Merle Oberon, he was of Anglo-Indian stock, and accounted for the former William Pratt's, Karloff's real name, swarthy appearance. When a member objected to Karloff's membership, it was overruled. The HCC may have had overtones of snobbery, but not race. Under the presidency of Smith, the first black member was included several years later and even one or two Americans joined the club, Douglas Fairbanks Jnr and Jack Oakie, one of the pallbearers at Errol Flynn's funeral. Along with another of Hollywood's King of Horror, Vincent Price, Karloff would become a good friend of Rathbone's. As an all-round sportsman and fitness fanatic, Rathbone's aptitude for cricket paled next to his colleague, Bruce's ability with a bat and ball was evident from a fairly early age. By 1910, he had already been selected as a player for his school's first XI and, in reference, to the past cricket season, had "improved immensely in the field." In July of the same year, he had been awarded his cricket colours and was considered "a stylish bat, somewhat of the ‘exotic' order. Has played some very good innings, particularly against Brightwell… needs more strength… but is inclined to favour only one department of the game."

In the following year, 1911, he is now pronounced as the "best all round man in the team. A sound and stylish bat and a good slow bowler. A fair field and a safe catch." In July, of the same year, he was awarded bat for his batting average, although, oddly, there is no record of what that actually was!

July 1912 and Bruce is one of the five remaining colours from the previous years. The team's "batting has been weak but Bruce and Walker have been very successful at bowling." W N E Bruce's figures being twenty wickets for an average of six runs each. He left in 1912 for the Stock Exchange, but he returned the following year to play for the Old Boys in "the 350th anniversary of the School cricket match." His brother was also present. Bruce's figures were bowled five and caught two, but he did play alongside fellow bowler and opening batsman N V H Riches, the Glamorgan batsman. Riches, a practising dentist as well as cricketer, scored 1,015 runs with an average of 92, just in 1911.

Just before the outbreak of the war, in July 1914, Bruce played yet again in the Old Boy's cricket match, described as one of the well-known favourites. "Bruce might have been dangerous but he was cleverly caught at point for 29." As for wickets taken, there is no record, as there is knowledge of him having bowled. N V H Riches also played and scored 92, who would combine his career with a drill as well as becoming captain for Glamorgan in 1921. He died at the grand old age of ninety-two in 1975.

Riches clearly survived the war, as did Bruce, but only just. Several of his team members would fail to make it. In the photograph of the first XI in 1912, W N E Bruce, seated, as always, second from right on the front row, G J H Ashwin, F W Lupton, W C Williams and A Davenport were killed in the First World War. From the previous year, 1911, B S Marshall and E M Graham and H V Campbell from 1910's first XI. The school's magazine last entry for Bruce is from Christmas 1919: "W N E Bruce… still in the Army in Ireland and playing cricket there."

Bruce learnt to play cricket as a young schoolboy and his elder brother believed his younger sibling to be good enough to play to "County standard". Unfortunately, the intervention of the twentieth century's first global conflagration put paid to that, but if Bruce had managed to avoid injury he would have followed in one or two decent players from his old school at Abingdon: George and Edward Ede. Twin brothers, they each played for Hampshire in the nineteenth century, but George was also a talented gentleman-jockey. In 1868 he won the Grand National on The Lamb but was killed two years later, when he rode another horse for the same owner in a steeplechase at Liverpool. Sadly, Edward never reached the dizzying heights of a Test career. Abingdon is now most famous for being the birthplace of the British rock band Radiohead.

Since the nineteenth century, Repton, Rathbone's alma mater, has an astonishing record of producing gifted cricketers. More than a hundred players have gone on to play first-class cricket with over ten playing Test cricket, as well as three becoming captains of England. The school's magazine, The Reptonian, does mention a B P, as well as a B P St J, Rathbone, as early as December 1907, where he played an in-house match for Cattley's against Gould. His figures were less than impressive, out for a duck, or no runs, and that as a tail-ender in the first innings. Cattley's still won, however. In the next match, started immediately after their last victory, Cattley's played against L-Z. Unfortunately, L-Z trounced them by seven wickets. Yet again, Rathbone scored another duck.

The following year, Hall (L-Z) played a match over two days in early July. Despite his poor showing the previous year, Cattley's opened the batting with D F G FitzGibbon. Rathbone failed to shine yet again, bowled out for a duck, clean bowled by J L S Vidler, in the first over and, apart from FitzGibbon and a score of thirty-four, the rest of the team folded. His stint as opening batsman was over, before it had hardly begun.

In July of 1909, against Priory on the school's Second Ground, Cattley's went into bat second and Rathbone bowled out one of the tail-enders, F M Wayet for a duck. And, in Cattley's first innings, Rathbone batted down the order, but amassed ten runs, so at least he had managed to get into double figures at last! In Priory's second innings, Rathbone bowled out only one player, but it was the opposition's top scorer, D I Day major, whose younger brother was one of Priory's opening batsman. Cattley's won by one run.

Just over a week after their victory against Priory, Cattley's faced up to Shearme's in the final. On the second day, R N Carr and Rathbone opened the batting for their team. "By careful play the score reached 30, when Rathbone was bowled by Calthorpe, who bowled Richardson, the next batsman, in the same over." Apart from FitzGibbon's prowess on the bat, Rathbone's dismissal started a batting collapse, as none of the other batsman could stay with FitzGibbon for more than five runs each!

Rathbone's only claim to fame as a cricketer appears to be that he was once clean bowled by J L S Vidler, the future Sussex cricketer; whilst both at Repton.

As a member of his cousin's theatre company, the Bensonians, he must have played sports of all kinds but there is no record of him as a cricketer. Frank Benson fails to mention Rathbone in connection with any sporting pastime, whether as a golfer, batsman, bowler or in the pool as a member of the water polo team! If there had been opportunities for displaying his skills with bat and ball on screen, no doubt he would have equalled those with a sword, but baseball has long been one of Hollywood's favourite sports, featuring in dozens of its movies, never cricket. Both Rathbone and Bruce would star alongside their Club President in Hollywood feature films, but Bruce had already had a working relationship with C Aubrey Smith long before they had reached California's shores.

Shortly after the end of the First World War, when Bruce had embarked on a career in theatre, it was whilst working as the assistant stage manager for a production of The Ruined Lady at the Comedy Theatre in London's West End that he had first met Smith's acquaintance. In a few years time, Bruce would be starring opposite Smith at the same theatre in The Creaking Chair in a cast with other budding stars, Fabia Drake and Tallulah Bankhead. Along with many other British actors, Smith would make the journey to Hollywood and eventually settling there for good.

With his tall frame, bushy eyebrows and bristling moustache, C Aubrey Smith cut an impressive figure, both on- and off-screen. As President of the Hollywood Cricket Club, resplendent in straw boater, mauve, magenta and black striped blazer and white flannels he was the epitome of the Englishman abroad. Such was his contribution to transatlantic amity that he was knighted for his services in 1944. He had already been made a Commander of the British Empire in 1938.

When the Club was first established, it had no permanent ground. Here, Smith acted as a catalyst. At first, after the British Consulate had been approached, the City Fathers granted land in Griffith Park. Further persuasion came from C J Williamson, a Park Commissioner at the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce, who just happened to be a member of the Hollywood Cricket Club. Five cartloads of English grass seed was transported across the Atlantic Ocean and a $30,000 pavilion erected on a site that would be called C Aubrey Smith Field. Sadly, it no longer exists. Los Angeles City Council had the area bulldozed and converted it into an equestrian centre for the Olympic Games that were held in the city in 1984.

Long before he took to the stage and met Bruce, Smith had been a cricketer. He had played for Sussex and captained England on their first tour of South Africa in 1888. In common with Rathbone and Bruce, he was a product of the public school system, although he had learnt his trade as a cricketer at Charterhouse, coached by the former batsman for Surrey and All England, Julius Caesar. Smith became a fast-medium bowler whose idiosyncratic action earned him the nickname "Round the Corner" Smith. "It is rather startling," said W G Grace, cricket's first superstar, "when he suddenly appears at the crease." When he settled in California, Smith called his villa at 2881 Coldwater Canyon, near Mulholland Drive, "The Round Corner."

On the silver screen, Holmes and Watson may not have been great cricketers, but Bruce did manage to introduce a fleeting comic aside about cricket scores in 1943's Sherlock Holmes and the Secret Weapon. Amazingly, Arthur Conan Doyle once bowled Dr W G Grace out in the second innings of a match in 1900, when Sherlock's creator played for London County against the Marylebone Cricket Club at Crystal Palace. The match ran over three days, from 23 August to 25 August, although rain stopped play on the first day. It was the author's only first class wicket and he even wrote a poem about it. Despite Conan Doyle's contribution, Grace had already piled on the runs, as he had scored 110 by the time he was bowled out, and the MCC won by two wickets. Not only did Grace have his son - W G Grace Junior - Conan Doyle was out for a duck in London County's second innings. Grace would later wreak his revenge at another match at Lord's, when the cricket world's first superstar captured Doyle's wicket.

After his one and only test, or engagement as they were then called, against South Africa in Port Elizabeth, Smith remained in the country and would eventually captain Transvaal. He abandoned a life in cricket to set up a stockbroking partnership with fellow player, Monty Bowden, but things went from bad to worse, as Smith contracted typhoid and the firm went bankrupt. By 1896, Smith returned home, with Bowden remaining in South Africa, but died soon afterwards.

On arrival, Smith pursued his alternate career and made his West End debut as the arch villain, Black Michael, in the adaptation of the classic swashbuckler The Prisoner of Zenda. Years later, but as the stolid retainer Colonel Zapt, he would act alongside several members of the Hollywood Cricket Club, Ronald Colman, Douglas Fairbanks Jr and a promising young actor called David Niven in the cinematic remake of Anthony Hope Hodgson's Ruritanian masterpiece.

Amongst its members, there were non-players or those who rarely padded up or fielded for the team, but there were others, such as Niven, who recognised the opportunity to network. Niven, however, was a regular and useful player. During one game in Pasadena, Niven batted at number five on a side that comprised two former England captains and one current. G O "Gubby" Allen made a top score of seventy-seven runs C B Fry made twelve, although Niven bested him by one with a score of thirteen runs.

As an ex-British army officer and Hollywood extra, Niven, with his pencil moustache, easy charm and a glint in the eye, used sport as a means to meet people in the industry. Not only was he a member of the HCC, but he also played golf with Jean Harlow and William Powell, as well as membership of the West Side Tennis Club, although that was largely down to the girls being prettier to those at the Beverly Hills Club. As the HCC played every Sunday, he had every chance to meet up with the stalwarts of the Hollywood Raj, from C Aubrey Smith, Sir Cedric Hardwicke and the Bruces. Niven would keep in regular contact with Bruce throughout the war, writing to him about events, both home and abroad.

Niven was good friends with another member of the Hollywood Cricket Club, Errol Flynn, Rathbone's screen nemesis. On a tour with the Club in 1936, Flynn displayed his ability to kick against any form of authority, as Smith was a disciplinarian of the first water. The team had been instructed to be in bed by ten o'clock, so to be fresh to compete against Vancouver According to the Club's secretary, Tommy Freebairn-Smith, Flynn had his eyes on the team host's female companions. Still, it failed to halt his endeavours on the field. The next day, Flynn managed fourteen runs before being bowled out.

It was on their visit to Vancouver that the team was photographed for posterity in front of the pavilion at Brockton Point, Stanley Park, Donald Bradman's favourite cricket ground, on 9 July 1936. Smith, resplendent in blazer, flannels and cap, is seated in the centre of the front row. On his extreme right is a nonchalant Flynn, pipe in mouth, with Bruce sat right next to him; still padded up and flushed from batting. Other British actors on the tour included Melville Cooper, Frank Lawton and H B Warner. In 1905, Warner had played at the Oval for the Actors' Fund alongside C Aubrey Smith and the minor-county player Oscar Ashe. Smith's first-class career had ended just three years before in 1902, when he joined the Actors XI. Their team colours were white, green and magenta, those of the suffragette movement, similar to the colours chosen by Smith for the Hollywood Cricket Club, thirty years later.

During this tour, Bruce excelled himself, both in front of the stumps and behind. Such was his enthusiasm, Smith was heard murmuring to himself, "Steady Willie, old chap, steady," as Bruce batted with such elan that he was lashing out at the wrong deliveries.

With Smith's background as a cricketer and his public profile as a character actor in Hollywood, he was able to entice players of the time to visit and play for the Club. When the England team of 1937, after the infamous Bodyline series in Australia, where they had lost the Ashes, came to California, G O B "Gubby" Allen, Walter Hammond and C B Fry all played for a combined Pasadena and Los Angeles team. Not only did they win but with four England captains of the past, present and future, on the team - Smith, Allen, Fry and Hammond in the field. Momentarily, Fry even considered a career as an actor, but soon realised he was less than suitable. As a sportsman, he would display his all-round athletic abilities, not just as a fearsome batsman, but soccer, and rugby, player. Off the field, he became a politician and writer and died in 1956, proclaimed the "grand old man of sport."

In Hollywood, Fry paid a visit to the set of 1937's The Prisoner of Zenda, one of the few costume dramas that neither Rathbone nor Bruce appeared in, although the HCC was well represented with the presence of Smith, Ronald Colman, Douglas Fairbanks Jr and Raymond Massey. Even the director, John Cromwell, was a member. Fry would write that the commitment of its players was "remarkable when one considers that many of them were not only rather old but had been badly injured in the First World War… Rathbone had the dubious honour of being strafed both by Goering and Von Richthofen."

Fry won his football colours at Repton so it was remarkable that Rathbone, another Old Boy of the school, should be reunited under much sunnier climes. In one match, Fry not only found himself on the same team as Sherlock Holmes, but Dr Watson (Bruce), A J Raffles (David Niven) and Frankenstein's Monster (Boris Karloff).

Bruce hosted one of Fry's team mates, "Gubby" Allen, that allowed him to bask in the reflected glory of an Allen innings of seventy-seven not out. Fry described it as "nearly as good as his innings in the test match in Brisbane" during their ill-fated Ashes series. Their stay, if anything, distracted Smith's concern about the coming conflagration in Europe. The England team would return home and to uncertain future. Other Britons, and rather less athletic ones, would cross the Atlantic the other way and make Hollywood their home, and employ members of its strange little outpost of Empire.

When Alfred Hitchcock made his first feature in Hollywood, it was to the Hollywood Raj, and the HCC, that he gathered his cast for the big screen adaptation of Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca. Besides Bruce and Smith, it would star Joan Fontaine and a youthful Laurence Olivier as the ill-crossed lovers.

On arrival at his hotel in Hollywood, the young Olivier was reported to have found a note slipped under his door from Smith that read: "There will be net practice tomorrow at 4 p.m. I trust I shall see you there." As David Niven once remarked, when "that Grand Old Man asked you to play, you played."

© Howard Watson 2009