I've embedded the official Twitter feeds for @HoudiniandDoyle, star @_Michael_Weston, and my own @HoudiniWild below. Please let us know you're watching and feel free to join in!
UPDATE: Thanks to everyone who followed and joined in on our live tweet or the East Coast premiere of Houdini & Doyle. It was a blast. We trended on Twitter for the full hour and the response was very positive. I think the series is off to a great start!
Thanks to Laura Benefiel and Michael Weston for letting me be part of this event. Houdini & Doyle airs Monday's at 9/8c on FOX.
Related:
I never knew Houdini dressed so well. I really enjoyed the show, anything with Houdini in got me.......
ReplyDeleteIndeed! :)
DeleteI enjoyed the show, it was not super fantastic but it was a fun way to see Houdini and Doyle interact together. Good story segment, good humor, sharp lines, enjoyable to watch. I liked the contrast with the serious woman Scotland Yard officer and foresee some good strong sub-plots with her "women belong at home" chief inspector.
ReplyDeleteThanks Arthur. I agree. Not super fantastic (although it continues to improve), but totally enjoyable, and a gift for Houdini buffs. And they continue to weave in Houdini history in a clever and respectful way. I will mine all these nuggets of history and discuss in my upcoming episode reviews. I actually think this fictional series does a better job than the Houdini miniseries.
DeleteTotally agree, John. While a LOT of liberties were taken (what was going on with the glass of alcohol and the opium pipe?), it was great fun to watch, and it didn't really pretend to not be fiction, things I can't say for the miniseries. I was reminded a lot of Daniel Stashower's Houdini mystery series, as well as his Sherlock Holmes/Houdini mash-up. If Houdini had lived to see television, I feel certain he would have done something a lot like this himself. I probably would have enjoyed it more if Bess had been included instead of the blonde assistant, but I guess no Bess is better than one viewed though the lens of artistic license.
DeleteIf you keep in contact with Mr. Weston, let him know that I think his portrayal of Houdini ranks right up there with Mr. Keitel's. He really captured Houdini's intensity and boyish exuberance without pushing it to an unbecoming level. The physical similarities help, too. I still can't believe he's over forty, though.
Very excited to see the rest of the series!
-Meredith
I will do that, Meredith. :) I didn't know MW was over 40. Looks so young.
DeleteWay too disrespectful to the actual figures and real history of Doyle and Erich Weisz, particularly in the portrayal of Houdini as some kind of transient American pop talent.
ReplyDeleteLoved many of the settings, though - wonder if they were real locations?
DeleteThey shot mostly in Manchester and Liverpool. Real locales.
DeleteAnd you mean EHrich, of course. ;) Sorry, pet peeve: http://www.wildabouthoudini.com/2014/02/2000th-post-how-to-spell-houdinis-real.html
DeleteAs we all voice our opinion on the series we need to keep in mind that instead of a book form, that this is a visual pastiche. Yes it features Houdini & Doyle and draws from their real life personalities but it is allowed to take liberties from the facts as it is meant to entertain. It is not billed as a biographical pictorial. It is in that regard that I sit back and enjoy.
ReplyDeleteExactly the way I see it as well.
DeleteA little irony. The Great Houdinis TV movie started shooting on the Fox lot exactly 40 years to the week of my visit above.
ReplyDelete