Review: HOUDINI’S GREATEST ESCAPE, Yvonne Arnaud Theatre - Tour

New Old Friends have built up a great reputation for touring shows over the last few years, most of them based around crime. Houdini’s Greatest Escape is an attempt to do something rather different, as they explain in the programme. Using many of the known facts around Houdini’s life, and particularly his antipathy towards the fraudulent claims of spiritualists, they add a fictional layer by creating a group of nefarious rivals who are out to murder the great magician and escapologist.

In writer/director Feargus Woods Dunlop’s fleet-footed production, the two main characters are Houdini himself and his wife Bess. As Houdini, Ben Higgins gives a confident performance, as convincing when escaping from cuffs as he is in his enduring love for his wife. As that love interest, Lydia Piechowiak offers an in-depth portrayal of a complex character, who was to outlive her husband for many years.

As everyone else, New Old Friends regulars Kirsty Cox and Adam Elliott are more than up to the challenges of playing multiple roles. Cox is particularly striking as spiritualist Agatha and as the very different and even more sinister Ma Barker. Playing at least eleven roles, Elliott is a suave Hardeen, a real character, as well as a bewildering array of quickly sketched-in large than life characters. The set by Caitlin Abbott is extremely effective and very ambitious for a touring production of this scale. Movement by Sam Archer and music composed by Guy Hughes also add immeasurably to the impact of the production, especially in the pacier and more musical second act.

Did it all work? Mostly, yes, although it probably needs a few more performances to develop the audience asides and to involve the audience a little more. The Officer Dibble/Ronnie Barker jokes go down well, as does the mention of Woking, and more of these asides would be welcome. Some of the meta gags (or gags about meta) might have been a little too subtle, but maybe the rather mature Guildford audience (your reviewer included) was a little slow on the uptake. The first act seems slightly overlong and the virtuoso display of ever more Scots characters at one point is at first amusing, then impressive but finally starts to lose impact as it goes on too long. Cox playing a clown and an elephant (at once) is very successful, but the excellent humanettes of the characters when on the train could have been so much more effective if the actors had been wearing black capes.

It is good to see the company branching out, but the reliance on their usual plot device of a crime story may not have worked to best effect this time; far more effective are the sections that are based on fact and aspects of Houdini’s life. The involvement of Pete Firman ensures that the magic presented is also of a high quality – and it’s no mean feat to turn actors into confident magicians.

Houdini’s Greatest Escape is a fun evening with lots of laughs, as well as offering some impressive magic and versatile performances. And the twist on Metamorphosis provides a stunning finale.

*** Three stars

Reviewed by: Chris Abbott

Houdini’s Greatest Escape tours until June 2024, with further information here.