Houdini Museum in Scranton, PA Reveals the Secrets of Uncovering Houdini's 1919 Lost Silent Film The Grim Game

By: The Houdini Museum
 
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The Houdini Museum Scranton PA
The Houdini Museum Scranton PA
SCRANTON, Pa. - Jan. 24, 2015 - PRLog -- Magicians Dorothy Dietrich and Dick Brookz, from the Houdini Museum in Scranton, tell the story of the finding and restoration of the long lost Houdini silent movie from 1919, "The Grim Game”.  Dorothy Dietrich and Dick Brookz from The Houdini Museum in Scranton, PA revealed, "The film has not been shown to the general public for 96 years.  This was one of the most sought after items in Houdini History. It has always been considered his best movie."

Houdini's movie Grim Game made in 1919, has been unavailable until now and considered lost.  Brookz commented, "The only complete copy of the film was hidden in the collection of juggler Larry Weeks who got it from Houdini's wife after Houdini died.  I have known Larry since I was in my early teens. Larry trusted us and knew we would never do any thing that was not in his best interest. He knew with us involved it would be done in a proper way to protect his legacy. We even put together and host his web site."  http://larryweeks.info

Dorothy and Dick had kept a friendly relationship with Larry Weeks and that is what helped to make this happen. Dietrich added, "Our show business contact for negotiations, friend for over 20 years, film producer Rick Schmidlin, was the right person to bring this project to fruition. Rick had to jump through a lot of hoops and clear several hurdles with tough negotiations. In the end, Rick put the pieces together to get the film, have it restored and added an original movie score. The wonderful thing is that the film content is complete, although it required a lot of restoration."

The restored film will have a musical score composed by Brane Zivkovic, an award winning film, television, and theatre composer.  This was all done with financial help from Turner Classic Movies, who will premiere it at the 2015 TCM Classic Film Festival held Thursday, March 26 – Sunday, March 29, 2015, in Hollywood.

Dietrich continued, "We are so proud to have accomplished this. To know that essentially every magician in the world big and small, will get the thrill of viewing this wonderful Houdini movie because of us. This includes future magicians for all time, as well as millions of non magicians. It was our goal to get this to someone who would release it to the public and not hoard in their cellar or a back room somewhere.”



Background information.



The Houdini Museum located in Scranton, PA is the only building in the world dedicated to Houdini. It has been put together by well known professional magicians Dorothy Dietrich and Dick Brookz. The Houdini Museum has also taken on the responsibility of taking care of the abandoned Houdini Grave site and recently replaced Houdini's missing bust that was destroyed 40 years ago by vandals.  http://houdini.org

Dorothy Dietrich is considered the leading female magician and escape artist in the world having been called "the First Lady of Magic," and "The Female Houdini." She has appeared in countless Television specials including "You Asked For It", a Bill Cosby Special, Montel Williams, "The Tomorrow Show", "Atlantic City Alive", "Just For The Record, the Best Of Everything", "Evening Magazine", etc. She was Special Guest Star in HBO's "The World's Greatest Escapes," costarring movie legend Tony Curtis, in which she escaped hanging from the bottom of a parachute ride hundreds of feet in the air while hanging from a singe piece of rope that was set on fire and she is the only woman in history to accomplish The Jinxed Bullet Catch in the mouth, the one stunt Houdini backed out of. The stunt has killed over 13 men and injured many others. This stunt was done at Resorts International in Atlantic City. Both stand as world records to this day. When not doing crazy stunts such as these she travels with a magic show that features doves, a duck, a rabbit and two pet poodles. When in her home town of Scranton she appears on a regular basis on stage of The Houdini Museum.  http://dorothydietrich.com

Dick Brookz has been a professional magician his entire life. He has fronted for Bobby Darin, Jack Jones and Neil Sedaka and performed at such venues as #1 Fifth Ave, The Rainbow Grill, The Americana Hotel and Casino in Puerto Rico, Aruba Hotel and Casino, etc.

 http://dickbrookz.com

Rick Schmidlin is a film preservationist, silent film scholar, and a producer-director whose work has focused on restorations, reconstructions and documentaries. In 1982 Rick produced music videos for several bands. Rick developed a career in film full time.  In 1986 he became assistant to the producer on the movie "The Fly" and worked on the feature film "Hoosiers".   Rick then produced the long form home video "The Doors Live At The Hollywood Bowl" which was voted #1 non-theatrical of 1987 by Video magazine. He produced four other projects for The Doors and MCA Home Video including "Doors Collection" a special edition Laserdisc/ DVD. He produced the film "The Doors:The Soft Parade - A Retrospective" (1991). During 1987 Rick was personal assistant to Frank Zappa, helping him develop his video enterprise. From 1987-1992 Rick created 'Easyriders Video Magazine' and produced, directed and wrote 13 hour-long Harley Davidson videos. He produced and directed two documentaries on the breaking of the motorcycle land speed record at the Bonneville Salt Flats, Utah, narrated by Peter Fonda. In 1998 Rick produced the re-edit of Orson Welles "Touch Of Evil" which premiered at the Telluride Film Festival and Toronto Film Festivals. He received special awards from The National Society of Film Critics, The New York Film Critics Circle, The Boston Society of Film Critics and The Los Angeles Film Critics Association for "scholarship and integrity". In 1999 Rick produced the reconstruction of the Erich von Stroheim 1924 classic "Greed" for Turner Entertainment and Turner Classic Movies. The American premier was at the Telluride Film Festival and the European premiere at Venice Film Festival. Special presentations were at the Pordenone Silent Film Festival, Italy, The Berlin Film Festival and the Moscow International Film Festival. Rick received from The National Society of Film Critics their 'Film Heritage Award' and from the Los Angeles Film Critics Association a special award for a "meticulous reconstruction". He also re-edited the concert film "Elvis: That's the Way It Is". He produced a Special Elvis Presley Theatrical Edition of "Elvis, That's The Way It Is" for Turner Entertainment and Turner Classic Movies. This film was completely re-cut and remixed. Included in this new version are nine additional new musical performances and many personal moments of Elvis working with his band that have been never been seen before. It premiered in Memphis at The Orpheum Theater as the main theme of "Elvis Week 2000". Schmidlin produced the restoration in 2000 of "The Dickson Experimental Sound Film" (1894-95 is the first known film with live-recorded sound) that was selected for inclusion in the United States National Film Registry. More recently Schmidlin has led a team in reconstructing the famous lost horror film "London After Midnight" starring Lon Chaney and directed by Tod Browning. Schmidlin has received the Special Award from the New York Film Critics Circle, a Special Citation from the National Society of Film Critics, and a Special Citation from Los Angeles Film Critics Association for his work on Touch of Evil. For his work reconstructing Greed he, along with Roger Mayer and Turner Classic Movies, won a Special Citation from the Los Angeles Film Critics Association. In 2001 he received the Rondo Award from the Classic Horror Film Board for London After Midnight that he produced for TCM. Rick is the only filmmaker to ever receive awards for two consecutive years from The National Society of Film Critics and The Los Angeles Film Critics Association.



Grim Game movie posters at http://houdini.org/thegrimgameposters.html



Contact info



More hi res pics available...


Penny Wilkes


The Houdini Museum


1433 N. Main Ave.
Scranton, PA.18508
 570-342-5555


magicus@comcast.net


http://www.Houdini.org



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Source:The Houdini Museum
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Page Updated Last on: Jan 25, 2015



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