Carleton Hobbs
| Carleton Hobbs OBE | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
Carleton Percy Hobbs 18 June 1898 Farnborough, Hampshire, England, UK |
| Died | 31 July 1978 (aged 80) London, England, UK |
| Occupation | Actor |
| Years active | 1920-1977 |
| Spouse(s) | Gladys Ponsonby (m. 1934-1978; his death) |
Carleton Percy Hobbs, OBE (18 June 1898 – 31 July 1978) was an English actor with many film, radio and television appearances. He portrayed Sherlock Holmes in 80 radio adaptations between 1952 and 1969, and also starred in the radio adaptation of Evelyn Waugh's Sword of Honour.
Hobbs was born in Farnborough, Hampshire, into a military family and himself served in the First World War. He trained at RADA and worked in London theatres through the 1920s, but by the next decade had become a specialist radio actor. His first broadcast was in 1925 as Hastings in She Stoops to Conquer. The Marlow, Henry Oscar, then a more experienced broadcaster, pointed him back towards the microphone when necessary during transmission. In 1934, he married Gladys Ponsonby, whom he remained married to until his death. They had no children.
For most of his broadcasting career he was a freelance, with the exception of the wartime period when the BBC formed its original Drama Repertory Company that could be moved out of London and away from the bombing. Hobbs was predictably on its strength, as was his regular future Dr Watson, Norman Shelley. In fact, Hobbo – as everyone called him – had played Dr. Watson before he played Holmes, in a wartime production of The Boscombe Valley Mystery with Arthur Wontner as the sleuth.
His own Holmes became a familiar performance after the war, at first in children's programming, later in the general services. Despite Hobbs's acidulated voice and his often trenchant or sardonic delivery, his rendering of the great detective now sounds somewhat avuncular – perhaps because of its original youthful audience, perhaps by comparison with later performances in the role, which became freer and more eccentric. Norman Shelley said after his long-time colleague's death: "There was only one thing for Hobbo ... the best and nothing less than the best."
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