One Hundred and Four years ago, The Grim Game was released in the United Kingdom on Monday, October 11, 1920,
To celebrate, I am sharing from my personal collection, the extremely rare insert from The Film Renter Moving Pictures News Magazine advertising the release date.
One Hundred and Five years ago, The Grim Game made its debut at the B.S. Moss Broadway on August 25th, 1919.
To celebrate, I am publishing the Houdini Movie Book we’ve been waiting for in hardback:
And sharing from my personal collection, the extremely rare program from the opening:
Front and Back Cover – HHCE Collection
Inside Program – HHCE Collection
The campaign book [in my personal collection] was sent to theater owners to encourage them to show Paramount movies. The book includes two utra-rare Harry Houdini Grim Game posters:
There is a 3 sheet version of the Aeroplane poster and 6 sheet variation of the jail poster, that appears in the Grim Game Press book:
And also many variant 8×10 stills of the jail poster image:
But, none of the stills exactly match the French Grim Game jail poster. The last still does match the Grim Game poster in the press book. One wonders if the artist took some liberties on the French Grim Game Poster.
According to Hollywood When Silents Were Golden:
…some years after the movie was released, Houdini used the final sequence [AKA “Desperate Chances”] in a vaudeville act. One night Tommy [aka David Thompson] took his wife to see the act and found that after running the clip in which the stunt man faltered and the planes locked, Houdini referred to this as his narrowest escape. He then invited members of the audience on stage. Wondering what Houdini’s reaction to him would be, Tommy joined the group. The great escapist recognized him at once and, without the flicker of a lash, identified him to the audience as “the hero who saved my life in The Grim Game.”
Of course it was really Christopher V. Pickup in the upper plane who saved Robert E. Kennedy (Houdini’s stunt double) as he hung from the rope. Tommy actually flew the lower plane.
It appears Houdini first used it as part of his act at the Keith’s Theatre in Boston MA:
Harry Houdini, a mystifier, has returned to the B.F. Keith circuit after an absence of two years in pictures. Houdini , who is a favorite headliner, has selected the water torture cell mystery for his act. He is heavily manacled and in full view of the audience placed upside down in a huge bottle like receptacle filled with water, from which he must escape quickly or drown. Previous to this act a picture showing Houdini’s miraculous escape from death in their remarkable act at the Palace picture, “The Grim Game”.
[Indiana Daily Times December 24, 1921]
Another example of Houdini using it as part of his act was at Columbia Theatre [Orpheum Circuit] in Davenport IA:
Refurbished, redecorated and claimed a stop higher in the standing of its programs offered a much improved class of entertainment. With Houdini as headliner and Flo Lewis as supporting feature, the bill had variety, balance and plenty of intrinsic interest. Houdini “goaled” the local audiences with his tricks…He carries with him a piece of film from “The Grim Game” the motion picture showing a real collision between two airplanes 4,400 feet from the ground. He shows audiences the Hindu needle trick in which he fills his mouth with four packages of needles and a handful of silk thread. Upon pulling the string out, the, needles are all threaded. He concludes with the Chinese water torture cell…
[Daily Times August 27, 1923]
And thanks to a John Cox post, we know that he showed it [March 4, 1924] at the Jefferson Theater in Charlottesville, Virginia as part of his Spiritualism Lecture Tour:
Image from Kellock book
The above photo is part of a series of extreme publicity photos that Houdini took in Hollywood while making his first feature film, The Grim Game.
HHCE Collection
Today I share from my personal collection, an article titled, “Houdini Sucessfully Monkeys With the Buzz Saw”, that appeared in the Sunday Motion-Play Magazine Rotogravure Section (May 25th 1919)
HHCE Collection
Related:
A Grim Game Title Card and Lobby Card Set that once belonged to the director, Irvin V. Willat, sells at auction
Yesterday’s Potter and Potter Auction had some great Houdini Movie Lots (27, 28, 32, 36, 39, 40, 75-82), with the highlight being Lot 75 which was advertised as a complete Grim Game Lobby Card Set (8) w/business card (Price Realized: $8,500) that a previously owner sold in 2007 (with a asking price of $2000.00 for each lobby card).
Below is Lot 75 description:
The Grim Game Complete Lobby Card Set. Paramount, 1919. Eight cards; title card and seven monochrome photographic images cards for the silent film starring Houdini. Story by Arthur Reeve and John Gray, directed by Irvin Willat. Together with an Irvin V. Willat business card SIGNED by Willat (possibly being the set owned by the director). All seven pictorial lobby cards depict Houdini, and three include scenes with handcuffs or policemen; two show Houdini on the Curtiss JN-4 “Jenny” (the film featured an unscripted mid-air collision between two Jenny planes). 11 x 14” each. Dampstains and chipping to title card, tape repair on verso; slight creases and pinholes to pictorial cards. The first complete set we have offered or found in the marketplace.
Min. Bid: $4,000.00 Estimate: $8,000.00 – $12,000.00
Note: The Grim Press Book Lobby Card Set (above) had a different Title Card and 8 Cards versus 7 cards.
(0) TITLE CARD
(1) “THWARTED – BUT ONLY FOR A MOMENT.”
(2) “GET ABOVE HIM! I’LL DROP TO HIS PLANE.”
(3) AT A HEIGHT OF 4000 FEET, HOUDINI CLIMBS FROM ONE PLANE TO ANOTHER
(4) FALSELY ARRESTED AS A MANIAC, HOUDINI BATTLES FOR FREEDOM
(5) SAVED AFTER A FALL HEAD DOWNWARD FROM A SEVEN STORY BUILDING
(6) THEY COULDN’T EVEN DROWN HOUDINI!
(7) “LOCK HIM IN THE STRONGEST CELL”
(8) OVER THE EDGE – WITH DEATH BELOW AND IMPRISONMENT ABOVE!
Below is an example of the title card and additional lobby card (8) shown in the pressbook:
These are 11×14 inch lobby cards, however, there is another set of 9 different lobby stills that are even rarer that were 8×10 inches with captions like CAUGHT; RUN TO SAFETY! I’LL FOLLOW IN A MINUTE!; PLANNING THEIR GRIM GAME; DEATH AWAITS HIM IN THE BEAR-TRAP; HOUDINI AGAIN RISKS HIS LIFE TO ESCAPE; I AM NOT GUILTY, AND I’M GOING TO GET OUT AND PROVE IT!; RACING FROM AN AEROPLANE 4000 FEET IN THE AIR, HOUDINI DODGE THE BLADES OF HIS ENEMIES PROPELLER; WITH A MIGHTY CRASH, THE AEROPLANE STRUCK THE EARTH; and a different Title Card.
original workbook photo in my collection
A previously owner sold this extremely rare set as well in 2007 (with a asking price of $14,000 for the entire set), Potter and Potter had it up for auction in 2023 (Estimate $15,000–$20,000 Lot passed).
Houdini Adaptations, plus Playwriting and Film Treatments: The Grim Game and Terror Island Stories is now available on Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk
Product Description:
Arthur B. Reeve and Houdini worked on three silent film stories together, ‘The Master Mystery’ (1918), ‘The Grim Game’ (1919), and ‘Terror Island’ (1920). ‘The Master Mystery’ silent film was adapted to a book in 1919. While not adapted to a book, ‘The Grim Game’; was adapted to a story paper format in 1920, just like ‘Terror Island’ was in 1921.
‘The Grim Game’ and ‘Terror Island’ story adaptations are featured in Joe M. Notaro’s book for the first time and illustrated with original movie stills to help tell the story. For each of the 3 films that Reeve and Houdini worked on, Notaro also shares the cast, synopsis, words of Houdini, history, advertising campaign, and missing footage information.
A 1924 newspaper article, ‘Houdini Breaks into Playwrighting’ describing a new previously unknown stage play that reads like the plot summary from ‘The Grim Game’, is also featured in the book, along with tidbits about each of his known stage plays: Challenged or Houdini Upside Down (1911), Walking Through a Brick Wall (1914), and Buried Alive (1914).
And as a bonus, Notaro shares the ‘Out of the Shadows’ Film Treatment from his personal collection that has never been published until now. Along with that, he summarizes and shares tidbits about each of Houdini’s other film treatments: The Marvelous Adventures of Houdini (1917), The Far North or The Man From Beyond (1921), Haldane of the Secret Service or Mysterious Mr. Yu (1921), Yar, the Primeval Man (1921), Il Mistero de Osiris or The Mystery of the Jewel (1921), The Great Tontine (1992), The Monster (1992), The Vulture (1992), Floating Through Space (1992), and Blood Brothers (unpublished).
Adaptation – a movie, television drama, or stage play that has been adapted from a written work
Arthur B. Reeve and Houdini worked on three silent film stories together,
And possibly a story serialized in the newspapers
HHCE Collection
The Master Mystery silent film was adapted to a book.
HHCE Collection
Terror Island film script was adapted to a story paper format.
Published by Joe Notaro (copyright 2022)
The Zanetti Mystery was planned to be adapted to a novel and movie.
HHCE Collection
And there is now evidence that The Grim Game, was planned to be adapted to a stage play.
The common thread in all the story adaptations is Arthur B. Reeve.
HHCE Collection
The following is from an article in my personal collection:
The first stunt Houdini performs is the opening of a barred door by manipulating a piece of wire and a bunch of keys so that he can draw back the bolt and so gain entrance. Then, whilst taking forty winks at this desk, his fellow reporters play a joke upon him and place handcuffs upon his wrists. They are amazed at the ease at which he removes them. Next he causes an automatic pistol to appear miraculously in his hand, which is held high in the air. He also opens a locked gate by manipulating the lock. When the hero is arrested for murder, he puts up a strenuous fight, but is finally overpowered by nearly a dozen men. Then he is chained, handcuffed, and locked so that it seems impossible that a man could get away. But he performs the feat right in front of the camera. Removing the chains he attaches them to a prison bed, and, using leverage, forces the bars over the window. Then he climbs to the ledge, and clinging to the wall makes his way straight up to the roof. He goes out to the end of a horizontal flagpole to secure the rope and climbs downward to earth.
Here comes one of the most interesting actions of the picture, although one of the quickest. Crouching in an alleyway, Houdini hurls himself between the front and rear wheels of a moving motor car, and with what seems like a continuous movement grasps the underhanging portion of the chassis and so escapes. He climbs up a drain pipe to the roof of a house, and by a clever move and by a clever move sends his pursuers on a false scent. But he is captured and is taken to an asylum, where he is placed in a strait-jacket, removes the ropes and falls to an awning many feet below. One of the most difficult of the stunts, however, is when Houdini, pinioned hand and foot to four separate bended trees, which keep him swinging in mid-air, effects an escape.
The greatest scene of all, and one in which was entirely unpremeditated, is when Houdini crawls out of the fuselage of an aeroplane and lands upon the top plant of another. But the machines, running too close together, suddenly strike, and the plane containing Houdini, the heroin and Allison makes a mad spiral dive to the ground and strikes the earth with tremendous force. The machine is broken up, but fortunately no one is injured. It had been intended to land in the ordinary manner.
[February 21, 1920 The Film Renter & Moving Picture News]