Last weekend to catch Houdini in SF

This is the last weekend to see Houdini Art & Magic at the Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco. The exhibition closes on Monday for its journey to the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art in Wisconsin, where it opens on February 11.

The Contemporary Jewish Museum is located at 736 Mission Street, San Francisco, CA 94103. For musum hours and information visit www.thecjm.org.

You can read about my trip to the CJM here.

The Magic Castle reopens TODAY

Great news! The Magic Castle is back in business starting today. The Castle has been partially closed since a fire on Halloween (the 85th Anniversary of Houdini's death) damaged areas of the Lane Mansion. Word is the damaged areas have not only been repaired, but have also received some much need improvements, such as more seating in the Closeup Gallery and a total revamp of the Dante dinning room.

The Houdini Seance Room, which sits on the second floor and contains rare Houdini artifacts, including a fantastic photo of Bessie and Castle founder Milt Larsen as a child, was not damaged and, as far as I know, has not been altered.

The Castle reopens today at noon for the Members Only Friday Lunch. I'm be heading up there to have a look at what's new and celebrate having our Magic Castle back!

Want to live in Houdini's house?

The realtor for Houdini's former home at 278 W 113th Street in Harlem, NY, has just posted a comment on my blog about the house from last year:

"Apt 3 top floor is vacant. Would you know anyone who wants to rent? I am the realtor for the owner."

Unfortunately, the realtor did not leave a name or contact info, but I'm pretty sure this is legit as the previous owner of the top unit threw a Houdini-themed moving out party in November.

So who wants to live in the home of Houdini?

Houdini is coming to Burbank

The legendary Paul Michael Glaser will appear at The Hollywood Show in Burbank on February 11-12, 2012. Glaser is taking part in a Starsky and Hutch reunion, but of course we know and love him as HOUDINI himself from the 1976 television movie, The Great Houdinis (to their credit, the show's website has a pic of Glaser from the film).

Glaser follows Tony Curtis, Johnathon Schaech, and Wil Wheaton as the fourth Houdini to appear at the show. I'll be there to meet my favorite Houdini (actually, I met Mr. Glaser once before in a work context). Maybe he can finally clear up for us whether he ever shot the Harry-Bess proposal scene on the Belmont Amusement Park roller coaster, as I covered in my Making of The Great Houdinis blog last year.

The Hollywood Show (formerly known as The Hollywood Collectors Show) is held at the Burbank Airport Marriott Hotel & Convention Center at 2500 North Hollywood Way, Burbank, CA, 91505. For show information and full list of the other attendees, check out the official Hollywood Show website.

This is J. Gordon Whitehead

This is the only known photo of Jocelyn Gordon Whitehead, the McGill University student who punched Houdini in his dressing room at the Princess Theater in Montreal on October 22, 1926. Whitehead's blows either started, contributed, or covered-up (lots of debate about this) the appendicitis that would take Houdini's life nine days later on Halloween.

J. Gordon Whitehead circa 1950.

This photo comes from The Man Who Killed Houdini by Don Bell, a MUST read for anyone interested in the events of 10/22/26. It shows Whitehead in Rodick's Bookstore in Montreal around 1950. Bell says Whitehead was 31 when he delivered the blows, so this would put him in his mid 50s here.

Sort of ironic that Whitehead is holding a book here. Returning a borrowed book was how he gained entry to Houdini's dressing room that fateful day. He was also charged with shoplifting books twice in 1928.

According to Bell, the troubled Whitehead died a recluse and hoarder in 1954. He is buried in an unmarked plot in Hawthorn-Dale Cemetery in Montreal, Canada.

Thanks to Dorothy Dietrich and Dick Brookz of the Houdini Museum in Scranton for this image scan. 

UPDATE: Is this J. Gordon Whitehead at McGill in 1926?

Related posts:

• Time to rethink the rethinking on the Houdini punch
• The eyewitness - Smiley's sketch
• 85 years ago: Houdini in Montreal
• J. Gordon Whitehead revealed in The Man Who Killed Houdini

The Man Who Killed released in U.S.

Houdini appears in the "rye-soaked neo-noir" debute novel by Fraser Nixon, The Man Who Killed. The book was released in Canada last year and is now available in the U.S.

Montreal, 1926. Mick is down on his luck until an old pal offers him a loaded revolver and a job: riding shotgun in a truck running booze across the border. Stateside Prohibition has opened up a market for certain amusements, vicious or otherwise. Mick takes the job—and his problems begin.

Through his old friend Jack, Mick falls deeper into the life of the small-time tough. From whorehouse to gentlemen’s club, through back alleys and deluxe hotels, jazz joints, opium dens, baseball diamonds, cheap diners and anywhere trouble is to be found, Mick burns his way through the City of Two Solitudes. Other people are in town for their own reasons. Babe Ruth’s here; Harry Houdini, too.

Of course, it was during Houdini's 1926 engagement at the Princess Theater in Montreal that he sustained the blows to his stomach that led to his eventual death. According to a review of the book in the Vancouver Sun, real-life eye-witnesses to the incident Jacques Price and Sam Smilovitz play minor roles in the book, and the author "offers up an alternate theory for what killed Houdini."

The Man Who Killed can be purchase now on Amazon.

LINK: A mysterious Houdini girlfriend

The single most viewed post here on WILD ABOUT HARRY is my blog about The Illicit loves of Harry Houdini. It's amazing, but every day that post draws substantial traffic. Sex sells.

Now Dean over at Carnegie: Magic Detective is wading into these same steamy waters with a candidate I missed: Hattie Mooser. If you can't get enough of this kind of thing, and judging by my stats, you can't, head on over to Dean's blog and hear the tale or when Harry met Hattie.

And while you're there, be sure and check out Dean's Houdini Hired To Entertain in Backyard, the untold story (as far as I know) of Houdini being hired to perform an overboard box escape at a private party.

Boardwalk Empire with Hardeen released today on DVD

Remy Auberjonois as Hardeen

The first season of the acclaimed HBO series, Boardwalk Empire, is released today on DVD and Blu-ray. What makes this notable for Houdini buffs is the season features an appearance by Houdini's brother, Theo Hardeen.

Hardeen is name-checked in episode six (Family Limitation) and episode nine (Belle Femme), then appears in person played by actor Remy Auberjonois in episode eleven, Paris Green. We even get to see Hardeen do a suspended straitjacket escape, which Auberjonois performed himself.

In an article for Genii (Nov 2010) Auberjonois told Jim Steinmeyer, "Before I read the script, I knew who Theo Hardeen was. I'd read The Secret Life of Houdini, the biography by Bill Kalush and Larry Sloman. At the time, I was naturally interested in Houdini himself. I think I related to him because I'm also from a Jewish Hungarian family."

For the series, Auberjonois received training in sleight of hand from Trey Lyford and was taught the straitjacket escape by Jared Rydelek. Of Hardeen himself, Auberjonois says, "The character definitely walks the line. You get an idea he's not as good as Houdini. He's defensive about his brother, and also boastful about his own contributions to Houdini's act. He's an interesting fellow, and definitely in his brothers shadow."

But is Hardeen's appearance in the series rooted in any reality?

While Hardeen became a regular performer on the Atlantic City's Steel Pier after Houdini's death in 1926, he actually wasn't performing at all during the 1920s when the show is set. Hardeen left the escape business in 1917 to run Houdini's New Jersey Film Developing Corporation (FDC), a task that proved to be more challenging than escaping from a dozen straitjackets. "It will be a Godsend for all of us if we get away from it in a legitimate manner," said Houdini.

Maybe Nucky Thompson could have helped them out?

The real Theo.

Purchase Boardwalk Empire on DVD on Amazon (currently 50% off).
Purchase Boardwalk Empire on Blu-ray at Amazon (currently 56% off).

Inside Houdini Art and Magic (Part 4)

Here's the latest Joshua Jay Houdini Art and Magic tour, this time all about Houdini's Milk Can escape. Lots of colorful embellishment here by Jay, and some scrambled facts. We do know how Houdini did the Milk Can. Also, I'm not certain this is Houdini's "original can." I'm pretty sure that's sitting in David Copperfield's museum. To me this looks more like the can used by Hardeen.

You can see a playlist of all of these on the new WILD ABOUT HARRY YouTube Channel.

The Houdini Box opens January 24

On January 24 The Chicago Children's Theatre will debute The Houdini Box, a musical adventure based on the book by award-winning children's author Brian Selznick.

Master puppeteer Blair Thomas directs this story about a mischievous boy who receives a special box that just might contain the secrets of Harry Houdini's success. Book and lyrics are by Hannah Kohl, with original music by Mark Messing.

Performances are January 24 through March 3, 2012 at Chicago's Mercury Theater, 3745 N. Southport Ave., followed by a suburban remount, March 14 through March 25 at the North Shore Center for the Performing Arts, 9501 N. Skokie Blvd. in Skokie.

For more information and to buy tickets visit chicagochildrenstheatre.org.

"You were Houdini, man!"

We don't miss anything here at WILD ABOUT HARRY. Check out this TV spot for the new Mark Wahlberg movie, Contraband. Houdini gets a nice namecheck right up front. In fact, Wahlberg's nickname in the movie is "Houdini."

Here's a thought. Could Mark Wahlberg play Houdini himself? He certainly has the build for it, and he's starting to look more like Harry as he gets older. Might this be Hollywood's way of softening us up to this idea? Is this subliminal advertising on the part of Universal? Could they have a secret plan to slip Wahlberg into a straitjacket!? Or am I going all Brad Meltzer on us?

Houdini comes to Providence

A nice collection of newspaper clippings from November 1925 advertising Houdini's full evening show at the Providence Opera House in Rhode Island have sold on eBay. I love ephemera like this. Imagine, you could go see 2 1/2 hours of Houdini for .50¢ or $1.50 max. Now if we only had a time machine...

It's also interesting, and poignant, that Houdini would spend his Thanksgiving performing a special matinee. This, of course, was Houdini's last Thanksgiving.

LINK: Boudini Unmasked?

Patrick Cullition, who does not believe for a second that Jacques Boudini was a legitimate rival to Houdini as I suggested here, has posted on his website the man he now believes played the role of "Boudini" for Harry.

Click on the headline to have a look. Pat has also posted the full length photo of Houdini and Boudini in their irons. I have to admit, his candidate does look a lot like Boudini. Hmmm...

Catching up on Houdini books for kids

Here are two Houdini books for kids that I missed when they were first released, but are now sitting happily on my bookshelf.

First up is Ray & Me by Dan Gutman. This book tells the story of young boy who time travels back to 1920 in the hopes of saving Ray Chapman, the only baseball player in major league history to get hit by a ball and die. Along the way our hero meets up with Babe Ruth, Tris Speaker, and Harry Houdini! The book even contains a few photos of Houdini (nothing we haven't seen).

Ray & Me was first released in hardcover in 2009. The paperback was released in February of last year.

Also new to me is an 8-page social studies school booklet, Two Master Magicians: Robert-Houdin and Houdini by Alicia Morton. It's a nice little study guide that's well illustrated. Two Master Magicians was first released in 2008 and can be picked up on Amazon.

Speaking of Houdini books for kids, Kevin Connolly has posted a nice blog asking the question, Why is Houdini Still So Popular? Kevin cites the Scholastic Book Company's offering of The Great Houdini by Beryl Williams and Samuel Epstein as one of key things that has brought Houdini to school children for generations, and I believe he's absolutely right. First published in 1950, reprints of this first Houdini biography for kids was offered via the Scholastic Book Service catalog as #T76 well into the 1970s. I know I found it on the shelf of my grade school classroom, and it was the first Houdini biography I ever read.

The 1965 and 1971 editions of Scholastic T76 - The Great Houdini

Head on over to Houdini Himself and let Kevin know what brought you into the world of Houdini.