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Nero Wolfe & Archie Goodwin

kevinburtonsmith

Created by Rex Stout
(1886-1975)

“Compose yourself, Archie. Why taunt me? Why upbraid me? I am merely a genius, not a god.”
–Nero Wolfe humbly confesses, in Fer-de-Lance

“Go to hell, I’m reading.”
— Archie has other things on his mind. Also in Fer-de-Lance

At first glance, Rex Stout‘s NERO WOLFE might seem out of place among the hard-bitten, world-weary, pavement-pounding P.I.s that this site is usually devoted to. Massively overweight (somewhere between 1/6th and 1/7th of a ton), he’s a cranky, agoraphobic and sedentary gourmet who rarely never leaves his swank Manhattan brownstone (with ten thousand orchids on the roof and a personal elevator). Wolfe is — in nearly every sense — a true armchair detective. And yet…

Nero Wolfe and his investigator/bodyguard/secretary ARCHIE GOODWIN are just as much “eyes” as their predecessors Holmes and Watson – with a big helping of the American P.I. genes that defined the genre.

Over Wolfe’s 40-year literary lifespan (with several additional and officially sanctioned adventures written by Robert Goldsborough), the fat genius and his sharp-eyed (and smart-mouthed) assistant bring down murderers, blackmailers, wartime traitors, and even (on one memorable occasion) leave J. Edgar Hoover out in the snow. These are men who make a good living at a difficult and dangerous business, not minor lords or churchmen who happened to be at the garden party when the butler was stabbed.

Wolfe himself, though temperamental as an opera tenor, unable to work without a steady supply of beer (Remmers, preferably, or his own homebrew) and so indolent that he considers playing pool or darts ‘exercise’, constantly exhibits the classic P.I.’s blend of cynicism, mercenary instinct and romanticism (though he would certainly admit to only the first two and adamantly deny the third, particularly where women are concerned). Over the years, Stout gave hints–but usually no more than hints–of Wolfe’s younger days, all of which suggest that Wolfe was himself a man of action once, and very much ruled by his passions. (Wolfe gave this away in explaining his present size and lifestyle: “I carry this fat to insulate my feelings. They got too strong for me once or twice… If I had stayed lean and kept moving around I would have been dead long ago.”)

There’s still a hard man under that fat. In the “present day” Wolfe is an intellectual mercenary: “I entrap criminals, and find evidence to imprison or kill them, for hire.” He will always serve the cause of right, but nine times out of ten it will be strictly for money (lots of it), and the tenth case will be a matter of pride or (more rarely) a matter of justice… or perhaps of outright revenge. He may seldom take to the mean streets himself, but he has a long reach–in the person of Archie Goodwin.

If Goodwin hadn’t gone to work for Wolfe, he’d certainly have his own agency by now (and temporarily does, in one novel). Far more of a traditional eye, Goodwin is a tough, handsome guy with a photographic memory, a .32 under his well-tailored suit (and sometimes an extra .38 in his overcoat pocket), and a well-developed appreciation for the ladies. And, in the opinion of more than a few cops, officials and stuffed-shirt executives, a mouth that ought to be nailed shut permanently. (Wolfe isn’t immune either–part of Goodwin’s job, as he sees it, is needling the fat man into taking cases, if only to make sure the bills get covered.) He’s not the deductive genius that Wolfe is, but a smart and tenacious op with a good right hook, and a decent and personable man. Most of all, in his narration of the books, he’s a helluva storyteller; it’s his view of the world, and his interaction with Wolfe, that keeps us coming back for each new mystery.

Master chef Fritz Brenner and “orchid nurse” Theodore Horstmann round out Wolfe’s household. Wolfe sometimes employs or works with outside detectives as well; his favourite hired guns are Saul Panzer and Orrie Cather, and he occasionally crosses paths (and swords) with Stout’s female P.I. Dol Bonner. (Another op, Tecumseh Fox, never made an appearance–although the second Tecumseh Fox novel, Bad for Business, was re-written by Stout as a Nero Wolfe novella–at the behest of his publisher, for supposedly double the money–and published as “Bitter End” in the November 1940 issue of The American Magazine. And Wolfe’s adversary/ally in NYPD Homicide, Inspector Cramer, got one novel of his own in Red Threads).

One thing which does set the Wolfe books apart from many others in the P.I. genre is their somewhat lighter and livelier tone; the stories often have reasonably happy endings, rather than the cold ashes and hangovers of the average op’s life. A few don’t end quite so well, particularly Stout’s last Nero Wolfe novel, A Family Affair (1975). Written at the height of the Watergate scandal, it’s probably the darkest of the Wolfe stories; Stout, a deeply patriotic man who often subtly worked his concerns about American life into his mystery plots, seems to have been writing under a cloud of anger and frustration at the corruption revealed in the Nixon administration. His death soon after left the book a sour and unexpected ending to his great creation.

The books have dipped in and out of print over the years, but are still fairly easy to find in used-book shops. The short-story and novella collections are uniformly good; the full-length novels are a bit more uneven in quality (some are excellent, but some tend to be novella-length plots stretched beyond their limits).

For those who want every detail of Wolfe and Goodwin’s lives and cases, William S. Baring-Gould, a journalist, literary scholar and Baker Street Irregular, compiled a plethora of references from the stories up to 1968 into a mock biography, Nero Wolfe of West Thirty-Fifth Street. The book also includes the famous essay speculating that Wolfe was in fact the illegitimate son of Sherlock Holmes and Irene Adler – and a brief note from Stout that neither confirms nor denies the speculations therein.

ADAPTATIONS

Through the years, there have been film and radio adaptations, and even a short-lived comic strip. The first film version, 1936’s Meet Nero Wolfe, was, by most accounts, quite a decent piece of work, with Edward Arnold shining as the gruff, rather unlikable detective, and Lionel Stander as Archie. Wolfe’s penchant for imported beer was replaced with one for hot chocolate, but it was Stander’s performance that author Rex Stout supposedly objected to. After the second film, 1937’s The League of Frightened Men, with Arnold replaced by the more affable (but miscast) Walter Connolly, but Stander reprising his role, Stout refused to sell the movie rights to any more of his books or stories. (In Stander’s defence, the books used as source material were the two earliest Wolfe novels. In those, Goodwin often comes across as a near relation to Race Williams or Three-Gun Terry Mack: more muscle than smarts, with the diction and attitude of a Dead End Kid. Stander’s usual on-screen persona would fit perfectly. However, by the time the movies were being made, Stout had refined Goodwin into a smarter and more developed character, still tough and streetwise, but with a better set of brains and manners. From comments by Stout, he apparently thought Humphrey Bogart would have suited the role well!)

The Adventures of Nero Wolfe was brought to radio in 1943 with Santos Ortega in the lead role, and in 1945-46 with Francis X. Bushman as Nero and Elliot Lewis as Archie. The most intriguing casting, though, was the 1950-51 NBC version, with Sydney Greenstreet as the fat man. It may have bee intriguing casting, but our radio guru, Stewart Wright, confides that:

“The Sidney Greenstreet run of the radio series starring has never been one of my favorites; Greenstreet overacts in it quite terribly. The other four ‘Archies’ in the Greenstreet radio series were: Wally Maher, Harry Bartell, Herb Ellis, and Larry Dobkin. In June 1999, at the Radio Enthusiasts of Puget Sound Convention, I got to see Bartell, Ellis, and Dobkin perform in a Nero Wolfe recreation. Dobkin played Wolfe, Bartell played Archie, and Ellis directed. The reason why there were so many Archies during the Greenstreet run is that the ratings for the series were never good and Greenstreet, as the star, could not believe that the poor ratings were his fault, so the fault must lie with the actor playing Archie. Therefore, actor playing Archie was changed several times. Obviously, the changes didn’t help.”

In 1977, a pilot film for a potential television show, simply entitled Nero Wolfe, was aired, starring Thayer David (familiar to many from the Dark Shadows series) as Wolfe, with a suitably brash Tom Mason as Archie and Biff McGuire as Cramer, and Anne Baxter as the guest star. This movie was based on Stout’s The Doorbell Rang (1965) and was an excellent adaptation. Leonard Maltin also gives it good marks in his annual movie guide. Alas, David’s untimely death postponed the series for four years.

By the time the series finally did arrive, though, it starred William Conrad (best known as Cannon, he of the equally-discriminating palate) as Wolfe, and Lee Horsley (future rich-guy P.I. Matt Houston) as Archie. Unfortunately, near-perfect casting and high production values didn’t turn into any kind of ratings success, and the show, although fondly remembered by some, slipped away after only thirteen episodes. (Most of the teleplays were loosely based–at best–on Stout’s stories, usually sharing only titles with the original material.)

Another problem, correspondent Mike Harris notes, is that “the short-lived series was placed in contemporary times rather than the original period of the books. Further, the series lacked the first-person narrative of Archie Goodwin, which greatly alters the ‘feel’ of the stories.”

In 1982, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation tried their hand at bringing back old-time radio with 13 one-hour episodes of Nero Wolfe, all based on novellas or short stories written by Stout. Mavor Moore played Wolfe and Don Francs excelled as Archie. By all accounts I’ve read, it was quite successful.

In 1986, the first of seven new Wolfe novels by former journalist Robert Goldsborough (with the consent of the Stout estate) was released, and were successful enough that following an eighteen year histus, the series was resumed in 2012.

Meanwhile, in 2000, A&E aired a two-hour TV adaptation of The Golden Spiders, starring Maury Chaykin as the big man himself and Timothy Hutton as Archie. The show proved successful enough that a new series, based on the Stout novels, tmade its debut in 2001.

The show turned out to be quite popular with fans, though it struggled in the ratings. Part of the problem may have been the show’s too-cute-by-half notion of a recurring troup of actors appearing in all episodes. It was hard to get your head around a killer one week being a suspect the next or possibly the victim. The plots, as they were, were intricate enough. Still, Chaykin was, as usual, impressively solid as Wolfe, and Hutton, as a flippant, wise-cracking Archie, was a relevation, all nervous energy and slick style. Alas, A&E cancelled the show after only two seasons.

But it’s not just North American television that’s come a-calling — over the years there have been series from West Germany, a couple from Italy and even one form Russia, featuring the portly, irascible detective and his wise-cracking legman.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Wolfe’s creator, Rex Stout, was an American mystery writer, businessman, and activist. Born in Indiana in 1886 to Quaker parents, he was raised in Kansas and, by most accounts, was quite the precocious child, reading the Bible cover to cover (twice!) before he was four, and becoming state spelling champion at the age of thirteen. After a brief time at Kansas University, joined the navy, and served on President Roosevelt’s yacht from 1906 to 1908. He worked as a bookkeeper, a salesman, hotel manager and store clerk, while trying to crack the pulps, cranking out tales of science fiction, romance and adventure. Ever practical, Stout teamed up with his brother, and established a business whose success would enabler him to continue with his writing.

The first of forty-seven Nero Wolfe books, Fer-de-Lance was published in 1934, to popular and critical acclaim, and by the start of World War II, Stout was a full-time writer. He was also a tireless promoter of the war effort, giving speeches, as hosting radio shows and chairing the Writers War Board. After the war he actively worked for groups including Friends for Democracy, Society for the Prevention of World War III and Writers Board for World Government. Not surprisingly McCarthy’s HUAC committee came sniffing around, but Stout managed to avoid appearing before them. Stout also served several terms as an officer of the Authors’ League of America and one term as president of the Mystery Writers of America. In 1958 he was honored with the MWA Grand Master Award.

Besides books featuring private eyes Dol Bonner, Alphabet Hicks, Sally Colt,  and Tecumseh Fox, Stout wrote several non-series books, including Under the Andes (1924), How Like a God (1929), and the political thriller The President Vanishes (1934).

THE EVIDENCE

UNDER OATH

NOVELS

 

SHORT STORIES

COLLECTIONS

  

COMIC STRIP

FILMS

RADIO

TELEVISION

REFERENCE, ETC.

FURTHER INVESTIGATION

Respectfully submitted by Don B. Hilliard and Kevin Burton Smith ((C) 1999-2013), with further help and ongoing contributions from Marc LaViolette, Eric Jamborsky, Alex Avenarius, Mike Harris, Brian Baker, James A. Rock, Mike Churchill and Tina Silber(television), Jean Quinn-Manzo (comics) and Stewart Wright (radio).

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