I could imagine being in this theater experience, but I think because of how he presented it as a real showing of spirits, and people never having exposure to his projection techniques before, it makes sense that the audiences went wild and the shows were initially shut down. I think if I had been there, I would have gone running to a church to find a priest to help me, and probably would have thought I needed an exorcism or some kind of religious protection afterwards.
The old memory it made me think of was when I was very young and went to Disney World and was in the haunted house, and this one room we all were standing in started to grow longer to expose more of these paintings of these characters on the walls. And then when I was in a rolling cart on a track during the ride, I saw my reflection in a mirror with a ghost sitting right next to me. It was shocking as a child to experience these types of optical illusions, but also very exciting.
