pages: unmaskingrobert00houdgoog.pdf, 134
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unmaskingrobert00houdgoog.pdf | 134 | THE PASTRY COOK OF THE PALAIS ROYAL four years before Robert-Houdin appeared as a public performer, Phillippe created a sensation in Paris, pre- senting among other automata "Le Confiseur Galant." In 1845, when Robert-Houdin included "The Pastry Cook of the Palais Royal" in his initial programme at his own theatre in Paris, Phillippe was presenting precisely the same trick at the St. James Theatre, London. Of this goodly company, however, Rovere and Phillippe deserve more than passing notice, as both were the con- temporaries of Robert-Houdin, and Rovere was his personal friend. Both also appear in Robert-Houdin's "Memoirs." The trick appears first, not as a confectioner's shop with small figures at work, but as a fruitery, then again as a Dutch Coffee-House and a Russian Inn, from which ten sorts of liquor are served. Finally, in 1823, it is feat- ured under the name that later made it famous, the Confectioner's Shop. Haddock, the Englishman who had the writing and drawing figure in his possession for some time, featured the fruitery on his programmes dated 1796. One of his advertisements from the London Telegraph is reproduced on page 106, in connection with the history of the writing and drawing figure, but for convenience I am quoting here Haddock's own description of the fruitery trick, which was even more complicated than the famous Pastry Cook of the Palais Royal: "A model of the neat rural mansion, and contains the following figures: First, the porter, which stands at the gate, and on being addressed, rings the bell, when the door opens, the fruiteress comes out, and any. lady or [ 117] |