BWW Recap: The Great HOUDINI and the Great Beyond - Part II

When we last saw our hero, Harry Houdini was trapped under the ice of the Mississippi River, a death-defying trick gone a bit off. As Part II of The History Channel's miniseries HOUDINI begins, he's still trapped and it's looking bad. Then, he sees what appears to be a mermaid with his mother's face. This vision leads him to safety. In this manner, the show's tone and purpose shifts. We have left the saga of a man compelled by his need to escape and laugh in the face of death. On we go to the story of a man haunted by loss, the afterlife and the supernatural.

His marriage to Bess remains rocky. She is tired of his increasingly reckless feats. After a straightjacket escape high above the streets of San Francisco, she berates him. He cares only for applause, not for her. She is "a dumb girl who married a Jew." Another body blow to Houdini. They finally reconcile as he promises to move away from his death-defying feats.

His career is on the upswing. He performs in the circus, making an elephant disappear. (We never find out where the elephant went.) He launches another European tour, just before World War I breaks out, and has success in London. There he meets Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Sherlock Holmes' creator, and his wife, both spiritualists. Sir Arthur pronounces, much to Harry's amusement and chagrin, that he believes Houdini's tricks stem from Harry's supernatural gifts. Although Harry protests, he cannot convince the writer that he is not possessed of magical powers.

The glittering European tour comes to an abrupt halt, when word arrives that Harry's beloved mother has died. Another massive body blow that shakes the performer to his core. Worse, as they stand in Brooklyn at his mother's grave, the loyal Jim Collins, his trick designer, asks Harry if he "can't do something about it." Even his closest friend believes he can beat death. But Harry, shattered by the loss of the only person he could really trust, knows that communion with the dead is impossible.

The sense of loss increases as the war breaks out. He sees the bullets he used in tricks wiping out thousands of soldiers. He sees the planes he loved to fly become instruments of destruction. He learns of the massacres of people he knew, like the Russian royal family. Finally, in despair and desperation, he attends a séance to try to contact his lost mother; however, the medium is a fraud. Enraged by the deceit, Houdini embarks on a mission to debunk and humiliate every phony medium and spiritualist that agrees to try to fool him. In his quest, he even debunks Arthur Conan-Doyle's wife, and a rift forms between the two men.

Houdini's greatest victory over the false spiritualist community is his debunking of "Margery," a celebrated, society medium. After he exposes her tricks, she attempts to seduce him in an effort to buy his silence. When he rebuffs her, she taunts him, "When you die, we [the spiritualists] will make you say whatever we like. We'll own you." Another body blow. Houdini admits to himself that statement makes him truly afraid.

Now, cursed by several of the angry spiritualists and truly terrified by the loss of control over his image after death, he begins to spiral down. He returns to his more dangerous escapes, much to Bess' despair. Finally, in an attempt to recreate the Chinese Water Torture in Detroit, a mistake is made. Houdini suffers a fractured ankle. In spite of the injury, he is determined to play the next show. Presenting a brave face, he invites some fans into his dressing room for an audience. Among this group is a young man who has been stalking Houdini. The newcomer asks about Houdini's famous claim to be able to take a blow to the stomach. Before Harry can make much response, the young man begins to pummel him, to avenge the honor of the humiliated medium, Lady Doyle. Houdini is terribly wounded. Still, the show must go on. But, though he makes it to the stage, he collapses. The pummeling ruptured his appendix and the infection has spread.

On his deathbed, in a grim Detroit hospital, he says his goodbyes and dies, seeing once more the face of his mother in the form of the night nurse.

So concluded the rather melodramatic, but richly envisioned miniseries about a very complex man. It seemed that focusing on his escapist tendencies in Part I and on his obsession with false spirituality in Part II oversimplified the subject, but Adrien Brody remained fascinating to watch throughout the two parts. The last, deeply sad image in the show was one of Bess, dressed in widow's clothing, attending a séance under a poster of Houdini. You can never really escape from your fate.

Photo credit: History.com

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