On September 29th 2023, I went to see Bess: The Other Houdini at the Grove Theatre, Eastbourne. There were six in the audience.
The play itself was slightly longer than two hours, which I thought a little too long: there were two moments before the end which I thought were the end. Good thing I didn’t start clapping!
It was mostly set in a sanatorium. Following the death of her husband, Harry Houdini the escapologist, widow Bess Houdini arranged a seance at which a message was reported: ‘Rosabelle Believe’. This was what Houdini had told Bess he would send if he could communicate from beyond the grave. Since Houdini, as a professional magician, was a famous debunker of seances, claiming they were faked, this seems a bit like having your cake and earring it. Much of the play explored whether Bess believed Houdini’s message was faked, and if so how. The second half included a seance which Bess staged ... and then explained how the effects had been done.
The acting was great. The lead - Pip Henderson playing Bess Houdini - was on stage most of the time and put in a fine performance. John-Christian Bateman played four parts. My favourite actor was Gwenneth Holmes who played a wonderful nurse with very distinctive mannerisms, voice and way of speaking. She also played Bess's sister; unfortunately this character was too like the nurse which meant she looked like the nurse in different clothes and a wig and this rather spoiled my suspension of disbelief, distracting me for the time she was on the stage.
My main criticism was that I thought the play rambled. It certainly covered a lot of ground: not just faked seances but also alcoholism, marital fidelity, attempted suicide, press intrusion, poverty ... I entirely missed the point of the mute patient in the wheelchair and I'm not sure that the other extra characters (Houdini's brother and lawyer, Bess's sister - who in any case looked and sounded far too much like the nurse for disbelief to be adequately suspended) were necessary. If I had written it, I would have pruned it and focused on the core issue of how we can tell whether something is authentic or faked; I'd have cut the cast to just Bess, the doctor and the nurse, and I'd not have started with Bess being hysterical (I think you have to work an audience up to hysteria).
But overall it was an entertaining evening and the company deserved far better than an audience of six.
But overall it was an entertaining evening and the company deserved far better than an audience of six.
Comments
Post a Comment