Schrödinger's Cat Trilogy

ESCAPISM

The first fame of Cagliostro began while he was touring with the U.S.O. during the war. He had entirely abandoned mentalism by then and his act depended entirely on escaping from everything the M.P.'s could devise to restrain him.

Variety called him "the new Houdini" in 1945, just a few months before Hiroshima.

His first arrest occurred in the fall of that year, possession of marijuana, the charges dismissed without a trial. (His agent's connections, the Crane family lawyer, the fact that the Crane fortune had not been wiped out entirely when ORGASMOR dropped to the bottom of the Big Board, and judicious oiling of what Show Biz and underworld people call "tin mittens"-officials on the take- contributed to this happy consummation.) He was one of the first guests on The Ed Sullivan Show, but was never asked to return due to a 1948 "morals" arrest: the girl was quite young and an "act against nature" was alleged. Once again, money changed hands and there was no trial.

His career was mostly "in the clubs" after that; Hollywood and TV were both in one of their chronic contractions of cowardice at the end of the decade.

A second morals arrest, followed rapidly by a second pot bust, made him a little too hot for most club owners. Still-the crowds turned out wherever he appeared. The mob decided to set immediate money against caution, and he was allowed to go on working. Until his disastrous appearance before the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1950.

"You're not a Communist, you hardly know any Communists, you could have sung like a bird without hurting yourself," his agent said afterward. "Why did you have to do it, baby?"

"Listen," Crane said angrily. "Do you think I can get out of a rucking set of Junior G-Man handcuffs if I let one single jot of fear get into my head? You don't understand. I can't let anything scare me-especially not shit-heads like them."

"It's your own funeral," the agent replied glumly. "I'll tell you the plain and varnished facts. You're gonna end up like Chaplin. Two sex scandals, two drug scandals, and now this. You're gonna end up worse than Chaplin. You're box-office poison, baby. From this day forward."