Jim Steinmeyer unspools The Spider

I just received the latest copy of Gibecière (Vol. 6, No. 1), the impressive publication of the Conjuring Arts Research Center, and I was pleasantly surprised to see it contains an article by Jim Steinmeyer examining Fulton Oursler's play, The Spider, a murder mystery with a magician as the main character.

Of course, Oursler was also the subject of my own investigation into his "Houdini" film project at RKO, Now You See It. You can read about that in the current issue of MAGIC Magazine. Great minds think alike? ;)

On a related note, Houdini expert Patrick Culliton says Oursler also wrote an unproduced play called, The Fox, which had a main character based on Houdini. Sounds like a follow-up to The Spider and, Patrick suspects, possibly a stage version of Now You See It.