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PARIS
WRITHES AGAIN
From
TIME Magazine
January 16, 1950
In its half-century at the blind end of a cobbled
alley in Montmartre, le Theatre du Grand Guignol has become
a synonym for blood-drenched horror on the stage. Until
the war came along, its 293 seats were filled nightly with
a faithful, shuddering clientele. Its finest hour came one
night when a woman in the audience swooned at the sight
of two harridans gouging out a girl’s eyes in their madhouse
cell; the management called for the house doctor, but he
had passed out too.
No
New Twists. The war made horror trite and started emptying
the Grand Guignol’s seats. Another blow:
the theater’s chief playwright, Andre (“Prince of
Terror”) de Lorde, died (in bed) at the age of 90. No new
twists in torture or tricks of realism e.g., “blood” that
coagulates as it cools could lure the crowds back. Even
worse, the sounds of skulls being crushed and bodies plopping
into acid vats began drawing guffaws instead of gasps. Things
got so bad that couples who took the curtained boxes in
the rear of the house looked to themselves rather than to
the stage for thrills. “The time had come,” says Owner-Director
Eva Berkson, “ . . . to modernize or die.”
Last week, swallowing national pride, the Grand Guignol
was modernizing with a shocker based on a trashy British
novel about U.S. gangsters, Rene Raymond’s No
Orchid’s for Miss Blandish. For the benefit of patriots,
Mme. Berkson explained:
“It’s just that we’re bringing the tradition up to
date.”
Eh
Bien . .
. Adapted
by Whodunit Editor Marcel Duhamel, Pas
d’Orchidees pour Miss Blandish was as different from
the old Grand Guignol classics as a Tommy gun is from a
thumbscrew. Amid knifings and kneeings, kidnapping and murder,
the meaty blonde Miss Blandish (Nicole Riche) spent most
of two hours in panties and bra, successfully pursued by
drooling Gangster Slim Grisson (Jean Marc Tennberg). A moving
touch for Grand Guignol fans:
Old Ma Grisson, the boss of the gang, beats Miss
Blandish into submission with a rubber hose so that Slim
won’t be annoyed by her cries when he rapes her.
Paris
writhed again. Reported Ce
Soir, with a wince:
“Never on such a small stage and in the space of two
hours has such carnage been wreaked. That is easily a record,
even for the Grand Guignol.” Sniffed Le Monde: “One can be
rather proud of being French when one sees imported products
of this kind . . .” But as the seats filled and couples in
the curtained boxes began to watch the stage again, Carrefour’s
critic seemed to have caught the audience’s mood:
“We had a crise
de nerfs, twisted our handkerchiefs, we held on to the
arms of our chair . . . Eh
bien, la tradition continue . . . |
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