I carved this pumpkin earlier today, deciding to go with a profile shot so it’s a bit different from the previous two year’s jack-o’-lanterns. Hope you enjoy, and Happy Halloween week (a.k.a. National Magic Week)!
Tom Interval
Houdini jack-o’-lantern in the dark, October 2013
Houdini jack-o’-lantern in medium light, October 2013
Houdini jack-o’-lantern in the light, October 2013
By Tom Interval
If there were such a thing as the perfect day to die, Harry Houdini would have thanked the Grim Reaper. The legendary showman escaped the earth 87 years ago this minute—1:26 p.m. (ET) on October 31, 1926.
To this day, the exact circumstances leading to Houdini’s death are still a bit hazy; however, here’s what we do know for those unfamiliar with the facts:
To learn more about the life, career, and death of Houdini, read the most dependable biography: Houdini!!! The Career of Ehrich Weiss, by Kenneth Silverman. (Note that even Silverman suggests Houdini might have had appendicitis before being punched in the stomach; however, we really don’t know that for sure. All we know is that Houdini looked tired and sick but not that he had acute abdominal pain before the famous punch.)
That clarified, best wishes for a safe and happy Halloween.
Tom Interval
Houdini scrapbook pages as seen in Page Flip View (Image: Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas at Austin)
By Tom Interval
The Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin has launched a new website featuring several free digital collections, including two that will interest Houdini buffs, magic fans, historians, and researchers: The Harry Houdini Scrapbook Collection and the Magic Posters and Playbills Collection. Prior to this launch, both of these outstanding collections were available only through the Victorian Popular Culture Portal for a fee (or free if you happened to be a student or faculty member at a university that subscribed to the Portal).
I’ve included brief descriptions of both of these collections below, with direct links to each subcategory or individual image so you can quickly dig in to the material yourself using the Ransom Center’s online viewer, which includes useful tools such as zoom in/zoom out, full-screen view options, page rotation, and “Page Flip View” to view images as if you’re turning the pages of a scrapbook or photo album. There is a combined total of 1,180 images in both collections, and individual images are downloadable (small sizes only).
Keep in mind that these digital collections do not represent all the material housed in the Ransom Center. Researchers are welcome to visit Austin to peruse the stacks and even take pictures in the reading room at no charge (for personal use only). To obtain a more detailed working inventory of either collection (in Word format), contact the Center’s Performing Arts staff or email me a request and I’ll forward the documents to you.
Harry Houdini Scrapbook Collection
(Descriptions from the Ransom Center website)
In the circle. The medium at work. (Image: Confessions of a Medium, by Griffith and Farran)
Description: The Harry Houdini Scrapbook Collection contains ten scrapbooks owned by the legendary escape artist Harry Houdini (1874-1926), whose vast collection of memorabilia pertaining to the history of magic was obtained by the University of Texas in 1958. The scrapbooks contain playbills, theater programs, clippings, photographs, prints, correspondence, and other materials dating ca. 1820s to the 1920s. Most of the content falls into two categories: notices and reviews of performances by magicians, and articles about magic and spiritualism. Nearly every scrapbook contains elements of both categories. Read more »
Total number of pages/images: 1,101
Links to individual sections:
Magic Posters and Playbills Collection
(Description from the Ransom Center website)
Balabrega, the Swedish Wonder (Image: Harry Ransom Center, University of Texas at Austin)
Description: The Magic Posters and Playbills Collection contains selected visual images from the Ransom Center’s Harry Houdini collection and Magicians collection pertaining to magicians and the history of magic from 1750 to 1920. Approximately 3,000 magicians are represented in the full collection. This digital collection includes selected posters, playbills, prints, and other ephemera documenting the careers of Harry Houdini, Jean Eugène Robert-Houdin, Harry Kellar, Henry Evanion, and others. Read more »
Total number of images: 79
Links to individual images:
By Tom Interval
John Cox of Wild About Harry (Photo: Copyright 2013 Tom Interval)
In 1980, 15-year-old John Cox told a Los Angeles Times reporter he was the third disciple of Harry Houdini. The first two, he said, were carnival worker Edward Saint and noted illusionist and author Milbourne Christopher. At the time, John, whose business card and stationery read, “John C. Cox, Houdini Enthusiast,” said he hoped to write a definitive history of Houdini. Thirty-three years later, the realization of that wish is Wild About Harry, the most comprehensive Houdini-themed blog on the Web today.
Although John launched Wild About Harry only three years ago, the blog’s origin dates back to 2005 when he created a monthly online newsletter called Houdini Lives, which became a full website the following year. But in 2010, John decided to transfer most of that site’s content from an Apple iWeb template to a more functional, smartly designed Blogger interface—the site Houdini fans and researchers worldwide are now familiar with.
“The simple idea was to create a website that keeps up with everything that’s new in the world of Houdini,” says John. “Wild About Harry still delivers the news, but it also includes my own experiences with collecting and going to events and doing research, or even just thinking about a certain topic. And now it’s become an even larger experience with people contributing material and participating in the research. I’ve been pleasantly surprised at how it’s become such a communal place and real hub of Houdini activity and thought.”
John Cox of Wild About Harry at his work station (Photo: Copyright 2013 Tom Interval)
Wild About Harry, which has drawn more than a million visitors since its launch, is packed to the pixels with primary and secondary research and interpretation, news stories, books, fictional portrayals, special features, cultural references, collection highlights, auctions, and external links to other original Houdini-related content. John says the main requirement for content to appear on his site is that it “has to interest me as a Houdini buff and historian. I figure if I’m into it, then all Houdini buffs will be into it.”
And to further enable the typical Houdini buff’s addiction, John has harnessed the power of social media to promote his blog and all things Houdini. At the time of this writing, John’s Twitter feed has attracted more than 350 followers while his Wild About Harry Facebook page has 700 fans. And those numbers don’t include the separate, specialized Houdini-themed Facebook pages he runs: Houdini (2,170), Bess Houdini (121), Hardeen (94), Houdini’s Movies (166), and Houdini the Miniseries (115).
John Cox’s childhood business card (Photo: Copyright 2013 John Cox)
Despite having several other interests, including Sherlock Holmes, James Bond, movies, Hollywood history, and Universal Monsters, John has lived and breathed Houdini since 1975, the year he saw Houdini, the 1953 film starring Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh, and Doug Henning perform Houdini’s Water Torture Cell on television. From that point on, he was hooked, and this “double whammy,” as he puts it, inspired him to read two books that would be the first to contribute to his lifelong fascination with the legendary escape artist: Houdini: The Man Who Walked Through Walls, by William Lindsay Gresham, and Houdini On Magic, by Walter B. Gibson and Morris N. Young.
John Cox, age 15, with some of his Houdini collection (Photo: Copyright 1980 John Rosenfield, Valley News)
With his father’s help in the 1970s and ’80s, John, who lived in the Canoga Park neighborhood of San Fernando Valley in Los Angeles at the time, substantially added to his library and has since amassed a collection of more than 500 books and some 1,500 other items, including original autographed photos, letters, posters, pressbooks, programs, publications, press clippings, multimedia, and other odds and ends, such as a chunk of glass from an original Houdini Water Torture Cell and even strands of Bess Houdini’s hair.
I had the pleasure of perusing John’s collection in September after he and I dined at The Magic Castle with actress Kristen Connolly, who was consulting us about her new role as Bess Houdini for History’s upcoming Houdini miniseries. John, who lives in Studio City about 10 minutes from the Castle, was extremely hospitable and gave me free reign to look through everything. Not only is it a great collection, but John is meticulous in organizing and caring for it.
John Cox featured in the Los Angeles Times at age 15 (Photo: Courtesy of John Cox)
Leafing through his personal scrapbooks took me back to my childhood when I, too, saved anything and everything about Houdini and magic. Every clipping was sacred, every ticket stub and souvenir program in its place. But my meager collection pales next to John’s. His bookcases are filled with stacks of Houdini-related publications and what must be almost every edition of every book ever written by or about Houdini, including some that are autographed by the man himself. Signed photos and letters are displayed or tucked away, and Houdini posters and novelties grace some walls and bookshelves.
John Cox featured in the Valley News escaping from a straitjacket at age 15 (Photo: Courtesy of John Cox)
Back in the day, the beginnings of this collection were substantial enough to earn John some publicity in a few local newspapers, including the Valley Chronicle, Valley News, the Los Angeles Times, and Hunters’ CALL, his high school paper, which referred to him as “a bit of a celebrity.” In a way, he was a local celebrity, even if only for a short time. In addition to collecting Houdini books and memorabilia, he put on magic shows at schools and other venues and performed Houdini-like stunts, such as escaping from a straitjacket and shedding handcuffs and chains after jumping into a swimming pool. He appeared on a local news channel and even performed his straitjacket escape on The Toni Tennille Show.
These days, John doesn’t perform. In fact, he quit when he was about 16 years old. “I just suddenly realized I wasn’t a performer,” he says. “I was a historian, and I stopped. It was that easy.” As a historian, John has learned from many Houdini experts over the years, including Manny Weltman, Patrick Culliton, John Gaughan, and Sid Radner. But one of his favorite moments was meeting Marie Blood, Houdini’s niece.
“That was an out-of-body experience for me,” he says. “I had driven to Colorado Springs, two days, and we were sitting together alone in a big hotel lobby beside a fire with a thunderstorm outside, and she’s sharing with me family secrets. When she told me Bess [Houdini’s wife] smoked, I almost fainted. All these years of study and then just one little thing like that from a family member gives you a key character detail that blows your mind. I really felt like I was in the room with Houdini himself. Like I said, out-of-body experience.”
John Cox of Wild About Harry with a small section of his Houdini library (Photo: Copyright 2013 Tom Interval)
Some might think John’s interest in Houdini is borderline excessive. That’s because it is, but in a great way. It’s his unbridled passion that inspires him to consistently produce original content, which, in turn, fuels discussions and debates among Houdini scholars and contributes to our overall understanding of one of the most significant historical figures to ever live. And that passion hasn’t waned in the least since 1975. John says he doesn’t know exactly which aspects of his personality so intensely draw him to the great entertainer. “It’s probably rooted in some deep psychology,” he says. “But I’m also a lover of mystery, the past, and all things gothic, and Houdini sits well in that frame.”
John’s passion—or “obsession,” as he once called it—is represented well on Wild About Harry, and for good reason: John is a natural writer and has been since he was a kid. “I remember when I was 12 or so, I sat down and started writing a book about Houdini,” he says. “I was dead-set determined to write a full book. I think I got about 25 pages done, which is a lot when you’re just sitting with a pencil and paper while other kids are playing outside.” Despite his childhood love of writing, John says he was a “terrible speller” and that the “massive mechanical aspect” of writing held him back until his college days, when computers and spell-check made those mechanics a bit easier. “It’s interesting to think that, for me, technology—the computer—is an essential writing partner,” he says. “Maybe that’s why I’m so comfortable being a blogger.”
When he’s not blogging, John, a graduate of USC School of Cinematic Arts, works in the film industry as a quality-control technician and screenwriter. In the latter position, he has penned projects for ABC, CBS, USA, DreamWorks, MGM, Sony Pictures, 20th Century Fox, and Warner Brothers. His first produced feature film, coauthored with Agatha Dominik, was Boot Camp (2008), starring Mila Kunis and Gregory Smith.
John Cox of Wild About Harry (Photo: Copyright 2013 Tom Interval)
With John’s connection to Hollywood, it’s no surprise he has a special interest in Houdini’s filmmaking career. His favorite Houdini film is The Master Mystery (1919), a 15-part serial starring Houdini as Quentin Locke, a Justice Department agent who investigates a shady patents company that dupes inventors. “He’s great in it,” says John. “There are some fantastic escapes. And it’s incredibly long. You can sit for hours and just watch the living Houdini. I love it.”
John says he would someday like to write a book about Houdini’s film exploits but doesn’t have time to research and write it at this point in his life. He does, however, plan to work on a book containing some of the best material from Wild About Harry. “I just really want to get some of this into a printed version,” he says. “I think people would really like it.” Other than that, he has no future plans for the blog. “I don’t try to force anything,” he says. “I enjoy how [the site] grows and evolves naturally.”
In the mean time, John plans to continue consulting on Houdini projects, giving presentations, writing articles for online and print publications, and, of course, adding fresh content to the blog. He has already appeared as a Houdini expert on the Houdini Exposed documentary; assisted NPR, BBC, and other media companies and organizations with Houdini projects; written two articles for Magic magazine; and given presentations at last year’s Magic Collectors Weekend in Chicago and the Official Houdini Seance in Fort Worth.
All of John’s exploits over the years make it clear that he transcended the role of Houdini disciple long ago. Not only is he “a one-man aggregator of all Houdini news on the web,” as David Byron of The Mandala puts it, but he is easily the most prolific, active, and original Houdini blogger out there, setting a new standard for the dissemination and interpretation of information relating to Houdini. These are qualities of a leader. The only disciples are those attempting to follow his example.
Related Links:
Harry Houdini, born March 24, 1874
By Tom Interval
On March 24, 1874—140 years ago today—legendary escape artist and magician Harry Houdini escaped from his mother’s womb in Budapest, Hungary.
Born as Erik Weisz in a room at Rákosárok utca 1. sz. (a street now known as Csengery utca), he would have that name for only about four years before he and his family moved to the United States, where his name was Americanized Ehrich Weiss. It wouldn’t be until around 1890 that he adopted the name Harry Houdini.
Since there are many biographies of Houdini on the Web, including a very good one on this page, I won’t cover the details of Houdini’s life here. However, I will share some photos of the building in which he was born, compliments of Google Maps. But first, a little background.
The building in which Harry Houdini was born, Budapest Hungary (Google Earth image with Photoshop filter)
In an email to me about two and a half years ago, magician Ryan Majestic claimed he was the first magician to physically track down Houdini’s birthplace. Having an advance copy of the book in which the Rákosárok utca address was first published, Ryan, by sheer coincidence, was already planning to go to Budapest around that time. While there, he took a couple pictures of himself in front of the door at that address. Here’s one of Ryan in which you can see the address placard.
Note that the door Ryan is standing in front of has since been repaired or replaced, and the placard is no longer there. You can see this by looking at the November 2011 Google Maps Street View of the location.
I’m not sure exactly when Ryan went to Budapest (probably in 2006 or 2007), but it’s only fair to mention another gentleman who tracked down the building: Attila Csordas, a bioinformatician at the European Bioinformatics Institute in the UK. You can read Attila’s Nov. 12, 2007, blog about that here.
Magic historian and collector, David Stahl, also went to Budapest to find Houdini’s birthplace. This was recorded in August 2010 on Kevin Connolly’s fine Houdini blog, Houdini Himself. If you look at the photo of David on that page, the building behind him is actually across the street from the building in which Houdini was born (assuming the original source was accurate).
In any event, here are some pictures of 1 Csengery Street in Budapest (again, thanks to Google Earth and Maps/Street View).
Happy birthday, Harry!
Google Earth view of the building in which Harry Houdini was born Erik Weisz on March 24, 1874, Budapest, Hungary
Google Earth view of the building (highlighted) in which Harry Houdini was born Erik Weisz on March 24, 1874, Budapest, Hungary
Google Maps Street View of 1 Csengery Street, Budapest, Hungary, where Harry Houdini was born (brown door is the entrance)
Google Maps Street View of 1 Csengery Street, Budapest, Hungary, where Harry Houdini was born (brown door is the entrance)
Google Maps Street View of 1 Csengery Street, Budapest, Hungary, where Harry Houdini was born (view from the opposite direction; brown door is the entrance)
They’re calling this “an unprecedented act of theft and vandalism.” The news broke this morning. Here’s a quick excerpt, but you can read the full story by clicking on the link below.
Body of Harry Houdini Stolen From Queens Grave
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) — Grave robbers acting under cover of darkness stole the body of famed escape artist Harry Houdini from an unguarded
Glendale cemetery early Tuesday morning in what police are calling an unprecedented act of theft and vandalism.
The NYPD is hoping the public can help them find three men whom a homeless witness spotted driving out of Machpelah Cemetery’s south driveway
sometime between 3 and 4 a.m. in a dark blue or black flatbed, turning and heading north on Cypress Hills St. … http://tiny.cc/cbsnews
By Tom Interval
Sid Fleischman and Bess Houdini (Photo copyright 1996 Sid Fleischman Inc.)
If you’re a fan of children’s literature, then you’re probably familiar with Sid Fleischman’s work. If not, here’s the scoop: Fleischman (1920-2010) was a Newbery Medal-winning author who wrote children’s books, screenplays, novels, instructional magic books, and a kid’s bio on Harry Houdini. In his youth, he performed magic in his hometown of San Diego, California, and, with a friend, even took his show on the road.
When Fleischman was still in his teens, he met Bess Houdini and apparently maintained a friendship with her until her death in 1943. In his 1996 autobiography, The Abracadabra Kid: A Writer’s Life, he includes a wonderful photo of him and Bess in Balboa Park in San Diego (see accompanying picture). Taken in 1936, the photo shows Fleischman at the age of 16 with Bess beside him signing a playing card. (When I first saw the image, I thought he looked older than 16 but quickly remembered Bess was only about 4’9″ and thus somewhat dwarfed by the young magician.)
Living only a mile from the park, I went there on a few occasions specifically to look for the exact location where the photo was taken. At first, it was a fun game to me; however, after about three or four unsuccessful attempts to locate the spot, I got antsy and finally sent the photo to an administrator of the Balboa Park Facebook page with a request to identify the mystery location. Within six minutes, the (unidentified, yet awesome) admin got back to me with an answer. Fleischman and Bess were standing next to the fountain of the Aztec Woman of Tehuantepec (La Tehuana), located in the park’s House of Hospitality courtyard. I grabbed my camera, headed back to the park, and took some shots of the area where Fleischman and Bess once stood about 78 years ago.
The image that follows is a side-by-side comparison, then and now. Obviously some things have changed since 1936, including some restoration and the addition of a brick foundation under the fountain. However, this is definitely the location. That sculpture, by the way, is by Donal Hord, who created the piece for the 1935 California Pacific International Exposition. I’ve included a few more images of the fountain, sculpture, and courtyard below.
To learn more about Sid Fleischman and his work, visit his official website at www.sidfleischman.com. To read more about Bess Houdini, check out some of the great articles about her on John Cox’s Wild About Harry blog.
Left: Sid Fleischman and Bess Houdini (1936), Right: The same location 78 years later at the fountain of the Aztec Woman of Tehuantepec (La Tehuana), Balboa Park, House of Hospitality courtyard, San Diego, California (2014) (Composite photo copyright 2014 Tom Interval)
Fountain of the Aztec Woman of Tehuantepec (La Tehuana), Balboa Park, House of Hospitality courtyard, San Diego, California (Photo copyright 2014 Tom Interval)
Aztec Woman of Tehuantepec (La Tehuana) sculpture by Donal Hord, Balboa Park, House of Hospitality courtyard, San Diego, California (Photo copyright 2014 Tom Interval)
Fountain of the Aztec Woman of Tehuantepec (La Tehuana), Balboa Park, House of Hospitality courtyard, San Diego, California (Photo copyright 2014 Tom Interval)
By Tom Interval
David Lubin (1849–1919), merchant, inventor, agriculturalist (Photo: Wikimedia Commons, public domain)
We know a few things about Harry Houdini’s New York City home at 278 W. 113th St. and even got a glimpse inside last year when the New York Daily News interviewed Fred Thomas, the current owner. For more than two decades, Houdini and his family lived in the 12-room brownstone until the iconic escapologist’s death in 1926. But who owned the home, and possibly lived in it, before Houdini purchased it in 1904?
According to real-estate websites, such as Zillow and Trulia, the 6,008-square-foot home was built in 1890 (five years earlier than what William Kalush and Larry Sloman wrote in their biography, The Secret Life of Houdini: The Making of America’s First Superhero).
The City of New York’s Automated City Register Information System (ACRIS) records for the Houdini property (Block 1828, Lot 59) go back only to 1979, when Marie Hinson (née Rahner), Bess Houdini’s sister, was the owner. Since online city records go back to 1966, it’s unclear why the records for 278 end at 1979. Here’s a screen capture of that search (click to enlarge):
My assumption is that serious Houdini researchers and biography authors, such as Kenneth Silverman and Kalush and Sloman, already checked the physical records dated before 1979.* However, neither of their bios—Houdini!!! The Career of Ehrich Weiss or The Secret Life, respectively—includes any information about homeownership before 1904.
Article mentioning David Lubin, a possible owner and resident of 278 W. 113th St. before Houdini, The Sydney Mail, April 8, 1903 (Source image: Google News archive)
After a bit of digging in the Google News archive, I found an article in the April 8, 1903, issue of The Sydney Mail, which mentions inventor and agriculturalist “David Lubin, of 278 West 113th Street, New York . . .” (see the accompanying image with the relevant line highlighted in yellow; click to enlarge).
Born in Poland, Lubin, an inventor of many agricultural contraptions, also lived in London; Attleboro, Massachusetts; Sacramento; and Rome, among other places. Assuming the Mail article is accurate (admittedly, when it comes to newspaper reporting, it’s not always wise to assume), it’s possible Lubin either lived in 278 or at least owned it. If so, Houdini might have directly interacted with Lubin during the property sale in 1904 and possibly enjoyed discussions or correspondence with him since both men had inventive minds (besides creating several original escape acts and paraphernalia, Houdini patented a diver’s suit in 1921).
If someone out there has evidence linking Houdini and Lubin, or any information regarding the ownership of 278 W. 113th St. prior to 1904, please contact me with relevant information and documents, and I’ll update this blog. Thanks!
*If you’re a Houdini buff living in New York and are interested in digging up old property records, the Manhattan City Register Office is located at 66 John St., 13th Floor, New York City, and is open from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Their phone number is 877-254-7234. And if you’d like to share any records you find, please contact me.
By Tom Interval
Adrien Brody in the two-part miniseries, “Houdini,” set to air Sept. 1 and 2, 9 p.m. ET/PT, on History. (Photo copyright 2014 TV Equals)
Today A+E Networks officially announced the premiere of the two-part miniseries “Houdini,” staring Academy Award winner Adrien Brody (The Pianist) as Harry Houdini and Kristen Connolly (House of Cards) as Bess Houdini, set to air Sept. 1 at 9 p.m. ET/PT on History. Part 2 airs the following night at the same time.
You may recall that last September Connolly consulted me and Houdini expert John Cox about Bess’s character. The series was originally set to air earlier this year until the network postponed it.
You can read A&E’s press release below or on their site.
History Premiers Houdini, Two-Night Miniseries Sept. 1 at 9 p.m.
New York, NY – July 21, 2014 – HOUDINI, a new two-night scripted miniseries airing on September 1 and 2 at 9 p.m. ET/PT on HISTORY®, is the story of a man who can defy death, but who really was the man behind the escapes? The event miniseries follows the epic tales of Harry Houdini as he emerges as America’s first bonafide world-renowned superstar.
From humble beginnings at circus sideshows to sold-out concert halls, Eastern European immigrant Ehrich Weiss rose to become a household name across the globe – Houdini. Academy Award® winner Adrien Brody (The Pianist) stars as The Great Harry Houdini as he finds fame, engages in espionage, battles spiritualists, and encounters the greatest names of the era, from U.S. presidents to Arthur Conan Doyle and Rasputin. A thrilling ride throughout Harry’s psyche, HOUDINI delves deep behind the curtain into his life through his stunts, his visions, and his mastery of illusion.
Joining Brody is Kristen Connolly (House of Cards, The Cabin the Woods) as Bess Houdini, the love of Harry’s life and right hand when it came to some of his most amazing feats, and Evan Jones (A Million Ways to Die in the West, The Book of Eli, Gangster Squad) as Jim Collins, Harry’s assistant and confidant.
HOUDINI is a Lionsgate/A+E Studios Co-Production. Gerald W. Abrams (Nuremberg, Family of Spies) and Andras Hamori (Sunshine) serve as executive producers of HOUDINI. Academy Award nominated Nicholas Meyer (The Seven-Per-Cent Solution) is writer and Academy Award nominated director Uli Edel (The Baader Meinhof Complex, Hotel Adlon) helms HOUDINI. Academy Award winning veteran Patrizia von Brandenstein (Amadeus) is production designer and Karl Walter Lindenlaub, whose work ranges from American blockbusters (Independence Day) to award-winning art house movies (Black Book) is cinematographer. Dirk Hoogstra and Julian P. Hobbs are Executives in Charge of Production for HISTORY.
About HISTORY®
HISTORY, now reaching more than 98 million homes, is the leading destination for award-winning original series and specials that connect viewers with history in an informative, immersive and entertaining manner across all platforms. The network’s all-original programming slate, including scripted event programming, features a roster of hit series including American Pickers®, American Restoration™, Ax Men™, Counting Cars™, Pawn Stars®, Swamp People® and The Legend of Shelby the Swamp Man as well as HISTORY®’s first scripted series Vikings, and epic miniseries and special programming such as The Bible and the Emmy® Award-winning Hatfields & McCoys, Men Who Built America, Gettysburg, Vietnam in HD, America The Story of Us® and 102 Minutes That Changed America. The HISTORY® website is the leading online resource for all things history, and in 2011, the United States Library of Congress selected HISTORY®’s Civil War 150 site for inclusion in the historic collection of Internet materials related to the American Civil War sesquicentennial. http://www.history.com. For more press information and photography, please visit us at http://press.aenetworks.com
About A+E Studios
A+E Studios is the in-house production arm of the award-winning global media company A+E Networks, LLC. A+E Studios commissions, creates and co-produces content across all networks and platforms under the A+E Networks portfolio, including A&E® Network, Lifetime®, HISTORY®, LMN®, FYI™, H2™ and A&E IndieFilms®.
About Lionsgate
Lionsgate is a leading global entertainment company with a strong and diversified presence in motion picture production and distribution, television programming and syndication, home entertainment, family entertainment, digital distribution, new channel platforms and international distribution and sales. Lionsgate currently has over 30 television shows on more than 20 networks spanning its primetime production, distribution and syndication businesses, including such critically-acclaimed hits as the multiple Emmy Award-winning Mad Men and Nurse Jackie, the comedy Anger Management, the network series Nashville, the syndication success The Wendy Williams Show and the critically-acclaimed hit series Orange is the New Black.
By Tom Interval
Here are some promotional photos from the upcoming “Houdini” two-part miniseries, set to air Sept. 1 and 2, 9 p.m. ET/PT on History.
All photos copyright 2014 A+E Networks.
http://www.history.com/shows/houdini
Adrien Brody (Copyright 2014 A+E Networks)
Adrien Brody (Copyright 2014 A+E Networks)
Adrien Brody (Copyright 2014 A+E Networks)
Adrien Brody (Copyright 2014 A+E Networks)
Kristen Connolly, Adrien Brody, Evan Jones (Copyright 2014 A+E Networks)
Kristen Connolly (Copyright 2014 A+E Networks)
Adrien Brody (Copyright 2014 A+E Networks)
Adrien Brody (Copyright 2014 A+E Networks)
Adrien Brody (Copyright 2014 A+E Networks)
By Tom Interval
In case you don’t already know, Potter & Potter is having a Houdini auction on Sat., Aug. 23, 10 a.m., in its Chicago gallery. If you live in Chicago, you can preview some of the items in the days preceding the auction from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. CST. Featured items include lithographs, broadsides, challenges, photographs, ephemera, Houdini scrapbooks, personal artifacts, handcuffs, magic props, locks, escape devices, and associated memorabilia, such as documents relating to Hardeen (Houdini’s brother) and other magicians and celebrities. To view the auction catalog online (PDF), click on the picture or on the following link:
http://www.potterauctions.com/pdf/Catalog_026_Houdiniana_WEB.pdf
By Tom Interval
John Cox, Kristen Connolly, and Tom Interval at the Magic Castle, September 2013 (Photo: Danny Binstock)
If you read this blog from time to time, you might recall that last year Houdini expert John Cox (Wild About Harry) and I were fortunate enough to have dinner at the Magic Castle with actress Kristen Connolly, who plays Bess Houdini on History’s Houdini miniseries, which premiers this Monday—Labor Day—at 9 p.m. ET/PT.
Kristen was nice enough to say some great things about John and me in some of her recent interviews. John wrote a nice piece about that on his blog, but I wanted to include the excerpts here as well.
‘Houdini’ Star Kristen Connolly on Mrs. Houdini, ‘House of Cards,’ and Wikipedia Errors
https://tv.yahoo.com/blogs/tv-news/kristen-connolly-houdini-213941724.html
Did you jump into research on Bess Houdini when you signed on to the movie?
I did. I’m really, really lucky, because what I started doing was just ordering these biographies, and they’re like 600 pages long each. I was sort of slogging through slowly. But I have a dear friend, Michael Mitnick, who is a writer and a huge Houdini fan. He knows an incredible amount about the Houdinis. I’ve learned that there are a lot of people who are sort of obsessed with the Houdinis and know a lot about them.
Michael put me in touch with a man named Tom Interval, who is a magician based in California, and he is a Houdini expert. He put together this packet of information: all the most important things that you could find, extracted from all of these different sources. I can’t even tell you how helpful it was. It was like 30 or 40 pages of material about Bess as a person: how she grew up, anecdotes that people told about her, her relationship with Harry, all kinds of things that were just unbelievably useful to me. I certainly could not have done all of that work in the time that I had without him.
‘Houdini’s’ Kristen Connolly captures the magic of Bess Houdini
http://www.zap2it.com/blogs/houdinis_kristen_connolly_capturing_magic_bess_houdini-2014-08
What kind of preparation did you do for this role?
I was really lucky in that a good friend of mine, a writer, Michael Mitnick knows quite a lot about Houdini and he was able to put me in touch with his magic teacher, Tom Interval, who is a magician based in California. I went out to Los Angeles and I was set up with Tom and John Cox who runs the “Wild About Harry” blog dedicated to Houdini, that’s just this awesome, wealth of information.
Tom put together this amazing packet of all Bess related information. He not only gave me this amazing resource, but saved me countless hours of pouring over all these books for information on Bess’ life. It’s a little bit harder to find stuff on her. There’s just so much written about Houdini and there’s a lot written about Bess, but you kind of have to sift through to find it. I referred to that document constantly while shooting.
History’s ‘Houdini’ Captures the Power of Illusions—and Love (INTERVIEW)
http://www.biography.com/news/houdini-history-channel-inteview
“I learned how to do something cool with cards,” she says. “[San Diego magician] Tom Interval gave me all the information on that. He taught me one cool way to shuffle cards that looks fancy on film. I don’t even know if it made it into the movie… Adrien really carried the bulk of the magic.”
HOUDINI: Kristen Connolly on Playing Bess Houdini
http://www.givememyremote.com/remote/2014/08/29/houdini-kristen-connolly-on-playing-bess-houdini/
How familiar were you with Houdini before you took this role? I think a lot of people might have a general idea of who he is, but did you know a lot about his life, his biggest magical acts, or how he died?
KC: Not really, no. I knew a little bit: I knew the name, and I knew he was an escape magician. Luckily, I have friend, he’s a writer, Michael Mitnick, who is actually a Houdini expert, and I had no idea about this. But as soon as I got the part — and he’s really close with my brother, Will — and [both] my brother and my fiancé said, “You have to talk to Michael Mitnick, he’s a Houdini expert.” He put me in [contact] with some wonderful information, and then put me in touch with some wonderful people in Los Angeles — John Cox and Tom Interval.
John has a blog called “Wild About Harry,” and it’s awesome. It’s in-depth, and has endless information about the Houdinis, especially on Bess. And Tom put together this amazing report for me with all the information about her. It’s harder to find information on Bess; you have to dig through things. So he saved me endless hours of reading every biography out there by putting it all in one place. I was really lucky to have people helping me on getting a handle of who she was. And she’s such a fascinating person, so it was really exciting to do that research.
Kristen Connolly on ‘Houdini’ and ‘House of Cards’
http://www.craveonline.com/tv/interviews/751547-kristen-connolly-houdini-house-cards?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=kristen-connolly-houdini-house-cards
Was the actual performance of playing Bess later in life the same as when you were doing grad school theater?
Yeah, it’s the same approach. You do the same homework. You try and find a character and find what makes people do what they do and what they care about and what’s important to them. That process is all the same, just on a much different scale certainly. Yeah, it was a really thrilling job to have and actually a friend of mine from graduate school who was in a class with my mother is sort of a Houdini expert. He’s a writer named Michael Mitnick and he knows tons about Houdini and actually put me in touch with some guys in Los Angeles who are also Houdini experts. So I got some insights thanks to grad school so it kind of came full circle.
Kristen Connolly tries a bit of magic in the new History mini-series ‘Houdini’
http://www.examiner.com/article/kristen-connolly-tries-a-bit-of-magic-the-new-history-mini-series-houdini
What did you know about Harry Houdini before getting involved in this project?
I didn’t know much beyond the fact that he did escapes. If you had said Houdini to me, the first word that would have come to mind is magician and that’s about it. My research started from ground zero, but I was really, really lucky. I had a friend from graduate school named Michael Mitnick, who’s a playwright, who happened to be sort of an Houdini expert. He was been able to sort of point me in the direction of certain books and of some really wonderful people in Los Angeles who are also Houdini experts. One of them, John Cox, has a blog called “Wild About Harry.” Anyone who’s interested in Harry Houdini should check it out.
What did you learn about Bess? Did she really smoke marijuana?
She did smoke pot. She drank a lot. There’s much less written about Bess than there is about Harry. But if you are so inclined, you can really dig and find it. I learned an enormous amount from [John]. He was able to tell me what was really substantiated, what was a bit controversial, what some people said but it’s probably not true.
By Tom Interval
Adrien Brody as Houdini, jumping into a very cold river in a scene that did not happened in real life. (Photo: A+E Networks) (Click to enlarge)
It’s the dead of winter. Thousands of gawking spectators flood a bridge spanning the frozen river below. The crowd braves the bone-splitting cold for only one reason: to see a man die.
Of course, they might not admit that, but death is what draws them there. Or at least the possibility of it. But escaping the Reaper under these conditions is nothing new for Harry Houdini, arguably the most renowned magician, escapologist, and showman the world will ever know.
With the crowd’s train-wreck gaze upon him, Houdini is handcuffed and locked into a wooden crate, which is slowly lowered toward a hole in the otherwise ice-covered water. The supporting chain snaps and the mob gasps as the crate plunges into the water and sinks to the bottom of the river.
Within seconds, Houdini deftly sheds the cuffs and escapes the crate but can’t find the opening in the ice when he tries to return to the surface. Running out of air, he frantically searches as the audience above waits. To stay alive, he takes breaths from pockets of air between the ice and the surface of the water.
Left: Tony Curtis in the 1953 Houdini movie (Photo: Paramount Pictures); Right: Adrien Brody in the 2014 Houdini miniseries (Photo: A+E Networks) (Click to enlarge)
Concerned, Houdini’s assistants use grappling hooks to fish the crate out of the water, only to discover the magician is not inside. Bess, Houdini’s wife, faints. The audience, assuming the worst, waits no more. Houdini’s assistant stays long after everyone leaves, waiting loyally by the hole for his boss to return.
Later, at the Houdinis’ hotel room, Bess cries as she looks out the window, hoping for good news to arrive. Enter Houdini. Bess runs to the door and smothers him with hugs and kisses. He’s alive! He tells her he found his way out of the water after following the ethereal sound of his mother’s voice, which led him to the opening in the ice. A few seconds later, the phone rings. The caller tells Houdini his mother died. (Twilight Zone music please, maestro.)
And that’s how the story goes, according to Houdini, the 1953 movie starring Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh. Unfortunately, there’s one minor problem with the tale: It isn’t true, as is the case with many legends and lore about Houdini.
Kristen Connolly and Adrien Brody in Houdini (Photo: Colin Hutton/A+E Networks) (Click to enlarge)
But knowing a story isn’t true doesn’t stop Hollywood from repeating or embellishing it. And why should it? After all, we’re talking about fiction, right? When creating a biopic, “you don’t necessarily get every single little fact right because that’s not the point of making one of these movies,” says actress Kristen Connolly in a recent Biography.com interview. “Sometimes with storytelling, the truth is in the bigger picture and not in every single little detail.” Kristen, known for her work in House of Cards and The Cabin in the Woods, plays Bess Houdini alongside Adrien Brody in History’s Houdini two-part miniseries, which premiers tonight at 9 p.m. ET/PT and continues tomorrow at the same time.
Kristen makes a great argument, but there are exceptions. Case in point: The Houdini biopic premiering tonight will air on the History channel. The operative word here is “History.” Sure, writers and directors have artistic license, but having a show air on a channel called History pretty much implies that at least the smaller details will be historically accurate. That’s definitely not the case with the miniseries, which makes several errors the creators either missed or don’t care about:
And the list goes on.
Some of the more significant scenes in the series are either inaccurate or invented, which is to be expected in a fictional portrayal. This is where artistic license comes in.
Left: from the 1953 Houdini biopic starring Tony Curtis (Photo: Paramount Pictures); Right: from the 2014 Houdini miniseries starring Adrien Brody (Photo: A+E Networks) (Click to enlarge)
Like the 1953 Curtis film, History’s biopic recycles the hole-in-the-ice story, which, by the way, Houdini himself made up, even changing the location of the event when retelling the tale to reporters. The version in the miniseries is basically the same as the one in the Curtis film except Brody’s Houdini isn’t locked in a packing crate and lowered into the water; instead, he’s simply cuffed and chained before jumping off the bridge. In both the Curtis and Brody films, Houdini prepares for the stunt by taking baths in ice water.
Left: Torin Thatcher and Tony Curtis in the 1953 Houdini movie (Photo: Paramount Pictures); Right: Evan Jones and Adrien Brody in the 2014 Houdini miniseries (Photo: A+E Networks) (Click to enlarge)
Another, less significant, scene in the miniseries that borrows from the 1953 film takes place in Harry and Bess’s bedroom on their wedding night. In the Curtis film, Houdini wakes Bess in the middle of the night and asks her to climb into a large wooden box, where she reclines with her head and feet protruding from the ends. Her bewilderment turns to hysteria as he begins to cut her in half with a four-foot handsaw. After the sawing and screaming stop, she asks him if they’ll be doing something like that every night. “Was it so awful?” he asks, to which she replies, “No, but I expected something different on my wedding night.”
Left: Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh in the 1953 Houdini movie (Photo: Paramount Pictures); Right: Adrien Brody and Kristen Connolly in the 2014 Houdini miniseries (Photo: A+E Networks) (Click to enlarge)
The scene blends perfectly with the Curtis film because the entire movie is filled with humorous moments like that. However, in History’s version of the scene, there doesn’t seem to be any purpose for it. It’s similar to the 1953 picture, only without the humor; and the wooden box they use is not the sawing-in-half trick but Metamorphosis, a trademark illusion Houdini performed early in his career, first with his brother Dash (Tom Benedict Knight), then Bess.
Left: Tony Curtis in the 1953 Houdini movie (Photo: Paramount Pictures); Right: Paul Michael Glaser in the 1976 television movie, The Great Houdini (Photo: ABC Circle Films) (Click to enlarge)
Not surprisingly, History’s Houdini is not the first biopic to copy ideas from previous films. The Great Houdini, a 1976 television movie starring Paul Michael Glaser and Sally Struthers, lifts a scene from the 1953 film in which Houdini picks a lock with his toes to escape from a jail cell. Both movies have our hero slip his leg through the bars of the cell to open the lock on an adjacent wall, but the ’53 version artfully incorporates its trademark humor into the scene while the ’76 pic plays it straight. Brody’s Houdini also escapes from jail cells but doesn’t pick the locks with his toes.
These are just a few examples of how Hollywood distorts Houdini history in the name of entertainment. All of those aside, I actually enjoyed both parts of the miniseries overall, even with its imperfections and cliché moments. I do wish its creators were more original. I mean, how many more times do we have to see the iced-river story in a Houdini biopic? There are plenty of daring escapes and close calls that actually did take place in Houdini’s career, and those could enthrall audiences just as effectively. Even so, I’d be lying if I said the series didn’t entertain me.
Part 1
Part 1, to air tonight, spans Houdini’s life from childhood to about the time he was performing his milk-can escape—around 1908 in real life. I’m not crazy about the jumps back and forth in time, with some of the most important moments in the life of young Ehrich Weiss (Houdini’s Americanized real name) glossed over or completely ignored. For example, besides Dash, where is the rest of Ehrich’s family? He had four brothers, one half brother, and a sister; although, the half brother died in 1885, so him not being in the show might make sense.
Adrien Brody and Kristen Connolly, Houdini (2014) (Photo: A+E Networks) (Click to enlarge)
Equally annoying were symbolic references to Houdini’s supposed Oedipus complex and the excessive number of shots showing his abdomen being punched, both from the outside and the inside, complete with muscle fibers, body fluids, and all. I get the reasoning behind this imagery, and it might have been more effective had they done it maybe three or four times throughout the series, but each time Houdini challenges a person to punch his washboard abdomen, or when someone says something emotionally hurtful to him: WHAM! PUNCH! (Slimy sounds) PUNCH! FORESHADOW! (The repeated punches foreshadow the supposedly fateful blows Houdini receives a little more than a week before he dies; the punches will forever be linked to his death, regardless of their medical relevance.)
To clarify, not all the CGI internal shots were bothersome. In fact, some of them were fantastic. For example, when challenged to escape from a pair of handcuffs, we see the internal workings of the locking mechanism as Houdini picks it (see the official Houdini sneak peek). Later in the same episode, we see a similar shot of the inside of a safe. In a shot during Part 2 of the series, we’re inside a cannon barrel as the propelled ball shoots toward us just before Houdini tries to escape from the ropes that bind him to the front of the cannon.
Adrien Brody as Houdini, about to perform the Bullet Catch (Photo: A+E Networks) (Click to enlarge)
Overall, Part 1 is packed with engaging magic and thrilling escape scenes. During the episode, Houdini escapes from two jail cells; presents his famous Water Torture Cell in which he must escape from a water-filled tank while hanging upside-down; catches a bullet between his teeth in a private performance for German Emperor Wilhelm II; gives a parlor performance for Tsar Nicholas II and his family; and escapes from a water-filled milk can.
My favorite scenes include the performances given for Wilhelm and Nicholas, on whom Houdini also spies at the request of US and British intelligence agencies. “One of the strangest illusions I was ever asked to pull off,” says Houdini, “was something called espionage.” And it is an illusion because there’s no evidence to show Houdini was ever a spy. But there was one stand-out spy scene involving an escape from a safe. At the risk of spoiling it, I’ll say no more.
Louis Mertens as Ehrich Weiss (Photo: A+E Networks) (Click to enlarge)
Also during Part 1, we see young Ehrich (Louis Mertens) as an apprentice to Maxwell the Magnificent (more artistic license from the creators); Houdini meets Jim Collins (Evan Jones), his chief assistant and engineer; he presents his mother—who’s dressed in a gown said to have been made for Queen Victoria—at a grand reception in Budapest for all their relatives; and sleeps with a woman (apparently Elizabeth Thompson, a British painter) after fighting with Bess (Hollywood seems to love stories of infidelity). This episode also touched upon Houdini’s Australian flight (he was the first person to make a controlled powered flight in Australia) and revealed several magic and escape secrets throughout. The episode ends with a cliffhanger relating to his jump into the frozen river.
Part 2
Adrien Brody in Houdini (Photo: Egon Endreyi/A+E Networks) (Click to enlarge)
The opening scene in Part 2 of Houdini quickly resolves the cliffhanger from Part 1. This episode, noticeably shorter than the first, spends most of the time on Houdini’s crusade against fraudulent spiritualists of the day, but not before a few notable scenes featuring an upside-down straitjacket escape, Jenny the vanishing elephant at the New York Hippodrome, and the onstage performance of walking through a brick wall. During the latter trick, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (David Calder) and his wife Lady Doyle (Linda Marlowe) are in the audience. After Houdini’s show, the Doyles go backstage to introduce themselves to Harry and Bess, and they all become quick friends, despite the fact Sir Arthur believes Houdini has supernatural abilities.
Adrien Brody as Houdini, riding Jenny the elephant (Photo: A+E Networks) (Click to enlarge)
After another fight with Bess, Houdini sleeps with yet another woman, this one who saw him perform the upside-down straitjacket escape earlier. Harry and Bess kiss and make up, but not too long after that, Houdini gets a wire telling him his mother, Cecilia Weiss (Eszter Ónodi), died (as written above, this was inaccurately represented as taking place in 1914; his mother died in 1913).
As most Houdini biopics do, this one implies that the death of Cecilia drives him to expose false spirit mediums. However, Houdini had an ongoing interest in spiritualism throughout his life, which is even illustrated in this episode with a flashback of Harry and Bess in their Vaudeville days performing a spiritualist-themed act in which Bess supposedly channels the spirit of a woman who had been murdered.
Nonetheless, it’s true that the death of his mother plays at least a small role in his crusade against spiritualism. He tries to contact her spirit many times during seances, each time becoming more and more discouraged. During this phase of his life, he exposes the methods of several mediums, sometimes attending seances in disguise, then whisking away his costume as he says, “I am The Great Houdini!” One of his biggest disappoints occurred after Lady Doyle’s failed attempt to contact his late mother through the process of automatic writing.
Megan Dodds as Margery the Medium (Photo: A+E Networks) (Click to enlarge)
Perhaps fueled by these disappointments, or by the fact that fraudulent mediums preyed upon vulnerable people who lost loved ones in World War I, Houdini targeted Mina Crandon, a.k.a., Margery (Megan Dodds), a Boston medium whom he exposed during a seance. After the seance, Margery, wearing nothing but a fur coat, propositioned Houdini while in his hotel room, hoping to convince him not to write his expose for Scientific American. Surprisingly (at least in the context of this show), he declined.
Adrien Brody and Kristen Connolly (Photo: A+E Networks) (Click to enlarge)
The final scenes of Part 2 include the events leading up to Houdini’s death—everything from breaking his ankle in Detroit to the supposed ill-fated punch leading to peritonitis and thus his untimely death. During a scene in the hospital just before his death, something happens I can only call creepy, for lack of a better term. I won’t describe it here, but it relates to Houdini: A Mind in Chains: A Psychoanalytic Portrait, the book upon which the miniseries is supposedly based (and written by the father of Nicholas Meyer, the writer of the Houdini series). I write “supposedly” because there are elements in the series that mirror those in another biography, The Secret Life of Houdini: The Making of America’s First Superhero.
Recommendation
As I wrote earlier, I enjoyed watching both parts of Houdini, despite some of its shortcomings. It might not be your favorite television series of all time, but it’s worth watching at least once, and if you’re a Houdini enthusiast like me, then you’ll definitely want to buy the DVD for your collection (no, Lionsgate/A+E did not ask or pay me to write that).
As for the acting, Adrien Brody and Kristen Connolly do a great job in bringing Harry and Bess to life in their own ways. The rest of the cast also is impressive, and the photography, costumes, and set design are well done.
My only complaint, besides the inaccuracies listed earlier, is that the contemporary dialogue and industrial-rock music seem to be out of place for the period in which the film takes place. It’s somewhat distracting at times, especially when some characters use terms and phrases not coined until well after Houdini dies. Examples include “Enquiring minds want to know” (1980s), “escape artist” (1940-1945), “pissed” (1940s, in the context of being angry), and shtick (1955-1960). And it wasn’t just the terms themselves but the actual manner in which most of the actors spoke. Also, there are some modern magic props in the film that have no business being in a period piece.
One of the strongest points about the Houdini miniseries is that it breaks new ground in terms of covering topics about Houdini’s career that are previously unexplored in any biopic. That alone should inspire Houdiniphiles to watch with sincere interest. And if you don’t consider yourself a Houdini or magic fan, I still recommend watching it because there are plenty of suspenseful escape scenes and interesting story lines. But please—please—keep in mind that it’s not a documentary. If you want to know actual facts abut Houdini, I highly recommend reading Houdini!!! The Career of Ehrich Weiss, by Kenneth Silverman.
HOUDINI
Production:
Lionsgate/A+E Studios Co-Production
Cast:
Harry Houdini: Adrien Brody
Bess Houdini: Kristen Connolly
Jim Collins: Evan Jones
Music: John Debney
Editing: Sabrina Plisco, ACE and David Beatty
Production Design: Patrizia Von Brandenstein
Director of Photography: Karl Walter Lindenlaub, ASC, buk
Co-Producer: David Minkowski
Producer: Ildiko Kemeny
Executive Producer: Andras Hamori
Executive Producer: Gerald W. Abrams
Writer: Nicholas Meyer
Director: Uli Edel
Executives in Charge of Production: Dirk Hoogstra and Julian P. Hobbs
Based on the book Houdini: A Mind in Chains: a Psychoanalytic Portrait, by Bernard C. Meyer, M.D.
By Tom Interval
Hearst’s, Dec. 1919 (Click on the image to read the whole article in PDF.)
History’s Houdini two-part miniseries, which aired in the United States on Sept. 1 and 2, introduces a younger generation to one of the most enduring Houdini myths of all time: the legendary escapologist and illusionist almost drowning under an ice-covered river during an outdoor exhibition in Detroit. Or was that St. Louis? No, wait, I think it might have been Pittsburgh. It depends on who tells the story. And the first to tell the tale? Harry Houdini himself, of course. If you’re not yet familiar with the whole story, read the first six paragraphs of my review of the miniseries. Versions of the fib have appeared in several Houdini biographies over the years as well as in the 1953 and 2014 biopics. To read the story as Houdini writes it, check out the December 1919 issue of Hearst’s, p. 40, in an article titled Nearly Dying for a Living (click on the link or on the image to read it in PDF). I post the article here to show members of the younger generation that not everything they see on History is true, despite the misleading name of the channel. In fact, most of what was on that show, especially in Part 1, was either a gross distortion of reality or pure fiction. You might also like to read John Cox’s excellent fact-check on the Wild About Harry blog.
By Tom Interval
John Cox of Wild About Harry today posted a beautiful Houdini poster that, to my knowledge, has never been published before. It’s from the New York Public Library Digital Collections.
While some historians might cringe at the notion of digitally restoring this image, I couldn’t resist. I wanted to see what it might have looked like back in Houdini’s day, without the tears and missing lettering. Honestly, I had trouble figuring out precisely how the original gray border fit into the design, but then I realized it might not have been part of the original poster. In any event, the poster on the right (see below) is the restored version—my interpretation of how the undamaged art probably looked.
My belief is that this poster is in the public domain, not only because of its age but because the source is a public library. If I’m mistaken about this, please let me know.
Before and after (Source Image: New York Public Library Digital Collections)
Part of the “Eclipsing Sensation” series of Houdini posters (Source Image: New York Public Library Digital Collections)
By Tom Interval
This year marks the 10th anniversary of Houdini in The New York Times, a website housing more than 125 articles and letters in The New York Times written by or about Harry Houdini. Please enjoy this brief history of the site and stay tuned for further updates regarding its future.
A clipping from The New York Times
Have you ever browsed the old Readers’ Guide to Periodical Literature? It was one of my favorite references in my alma mater’s library, and Houdini was the first thing I looked up in those massive green volumes.
Houdini-related articles were in abundance, and many appeared in The New York Times, which isn’t surprising considering Houdini lived in New York City for the greater part of his life.
As you might recall from the pre-Internet days, to view articles listed in the Readers’ Guide, you had to first find them on microfilm, then view the film on a microfilm reader.
The original Houdini in The New York Times, in binder form
For whatever reason, I fixated on the Times articles about Houdini and listed in a notebook everything I could find. Over the course of several months, I found every last article on film and printed a copy of each, storing them in a binder I titled, Harry Houdini in The New York Times. That was back in 1997, and the binder lived among my Houdini books for the next seven years.
With the advent of the World Wide Web, I learned to create simple websites by studying a beginner’s book on web design. Not too long after that, I developed my first significant website: Interval Magic: intervalmagic.com (see the original archived version on the Internet Archive).
Pages of the original Houdini in The New York Times, in binder form
With the Interval Magic site under my belt, I decided to build a website all about Houdini, my childhood hero. My original goal was to create a virtual Houdini museum of sorts, calling it Houdini Museum, which would include biographical information, news clippings, images, videos, audio, reference materials, and some personal photos from my trips to Houdini’s gravesite, the Houdini Magical Hall of Fame in Niagara Falls, and the Library of Congress, where the majority of Houdini’s literature collection resides. I quickly purchased the domain houdinimuseum.org and got to work.
Clipping from The New York Times
Realizing how time-consuming making the website would be, I decided, in the mean time, to post The New York Times articles I collected seven years earlier. After hand-keying more than 125 Times articles and letters and designing what was meant to be a temporary website, I launched Houdini in The New York Times in the Spring of 2004.
The site is a wonderful free (and ad-free) resource for Houdini researchers and enthusiasts, but it’s not the comprehensive Houdini site I had once planned. Now well into its 10th year, Houdini in The New York Times hasn’t changed much, but please stay tuned because I haven’t abandoned the original plan.
Please visit Houdini in The New York Times!
While my original idea for the site hasn’t seen the light of day yet, I’ve been working on it sporadically (albeit as slow as a snail crawling in tar) as I keep this blog active and plan to launch a completely revamped houdinimuseum.org in the near future. The new site will still include the Times material, but that will be only one small part of it.
I’ll say no more; however, in the months ahead, please follow this blog and accompanying Facebook page and look for teasers and announcements, which will include more info on the site’s content and an actual launch date. Until then, please enjoy Houdini in The New York Times as it celebrates its 10th anniversary.
By Tom Interval
It was exactly 100 years ago today that Houdini recorded his voice on Edison wax cylinders. This particular version is one I put together a couple of years ago. It’s about 3½ minutes long and is different from the standard version you’ll find online. Although the cylinders were made on October 29, 1914, they weren’t found until 1970. Watch the video for details. Happy Houdini Voice Day!
By Tom Interval
For this year’s Houdini jack-o’-lantern, I wanted to make a scary version of Houdini’s face. It’s not perfect, but I think I’ve accomplished the scary part. Hope you enjoy, and Happy Halloween week (a.k.a., National Magic Week)!
Houdini Jack-o’-Lantern, copyright 2014 Tom Interval
Houdini Jack-o’-Lantern, copyright 2014 Tom Interval
Copyright 2014 Tom Interval
Copyright 2014 Tom Interval
Copyright 2014 Tom Interval
Copyright 2014 Tom Interval
Happy Halloween!
By Tom Interval
I meant to post this image on Saturday. On that day 209 years ago, the pioneering French conjurer, Jean Eugène Robert-Houdin, was born. Robert-Houdin is known as the “father of modern magic” and is the man whose name young Ehrich Weiss would borrow 85 years later to become Harry Houdini.
