Lest anyone think the world of magic is all fun, games, and neat props; The Dallas Star-Telegram gives us the depressing nit and grit of the working magician’s life.
We usually refer you to the stories we find but this one may be too intense. Please, do not read the article if you have any doubts about your role in the fun world of Magic. Even then, read it with a buddy so you can thwart any attempts at self-injury or worse.
The article purports to be a profile of the working magician in these times of video magic. It is not an upper.
We are introduced to three magicians working and working it. One of the three is changing his name to fit his new character. James Veltrop is a salesman at Dallas’ Magic Etc. and is quoted as saying he hasn’t met someone working magic full-time in his eight years at the shop.
Performers change their names to fit market niches that may or may not exist in a desperate attempt to be booked. The reporter notes:
Names are ephemeral in the incredibly shrinking community of working magicians. Professor Moon, who also goes by Gran-Da-Dee, knows he has to be willing to change his name, his act and his whole approach to magic to appeal to kids in the Age of Harry Potter. The 72-year-old Arlington native has tried to make a full-time living as a performer ever since he left Tandy Corp. in 1985. But it hasn’t been easy.
“Not too many can manage that, and we all do just about anything legal,” Earl Warren says, chuckling. “When I have to, I even do singing telegrams. At various times I have as many as 15 agents looking for business for me. You really have to be constantly on the lookout for work. It doesn’t just come to you.”
Okey Doke. Hang on while we get this noose fixed up good and tight.
The blame lies not on magicians per se; but the world in which we practice. At least that’s the article’s hook.
For a generation of kids raised on Harry Potter and David Blaine, sophisticated special effects and video games, not to mention TV specials that spell out how tricks are done, the old-time magician is becoming as pass? as, well, pulling a rabbit out of a hat. The fraternity of dyed-in-the-wool magicians is being forced to change with the times — or simply fade away.
And yet, amidst the nuclear winter, a flower grows. The article describes with what seems to be a pitying tone Ken Stewart’s decision to go into magic full-time.
“A couple of months ago, I had something almost like a revelation,” he says. “I’ve worked as ‘Uncle Ken & Topper’ — Topper is my bunny rabbit who lives in a top hat — and I thought, ‘Uncle Ken doesn’t have any punch.’ Working here, I’m around wigs and costumes, and I started trying on hats. I thought I’d remake my act to have a different hat for each trick. I’ll be ‘The Magical Glad Hatter.’ ”
We received a press release from Mac King’s people announcing his participation in the inevitable media-frenzy tomorrow night. Mr. King put together a show to coincide with the release of J.K. Rowling’s latest novel about the young wizard.
Mr. King will begin the show promptly at 11:00 pm at the Barnes and Noble in Las Vegas. He’ll need to be done within 59 minutes, however. At precisely 11:59, the long-awaited tome will be on sale.
The Washington Post had an interesting article today about the Harry Potter parties set to take place tomorrow night in advance of the 11:59 release. “While bookstores are largely relying on huge late-night launch parties complete with sorting hat competitions offering iPods and signed books as prizes ahead of the midnight release, supermarkets and online retailers are trying to cast their own spell.”
Amazon reports it has over half a million pre-orders from the UK alone.
The US publisher, Scholastic Books, will print approximately 10 million copies.
We’d love to see Mr. King’s performance tomorrow night. Unfortunately, it is well-past our bedtime and we’re in Michigan. If a loyal reader has a chance to swing by the bookstore, we’d welcome the chance to publish a review here.
There are two ironic aspects to the story. First, the publishers and booksellers are spending so much to promote a book likely to sell over 12 million copies in its first printing. Second, that the star of the afternoon shows in Vegas, will be working a midnight show for kids.
Call us brilliant but we were thinking maybe magicians could take advantage of this whole Harry Potter thing. Imagine doing a show that some how incorporated the young wizard theme or performed tricks similar to the ones the young wizards learn in their special school.
You’d have to be careful not to infringe on the copyright or trademarks of Ms. Rowling, but it might just work. We are working on a routine where we play the dunce of the wizard school. We have a dunce cap instead of the Wizard’s hat; we use a squeegee instead of a magic wand; and make everything turn into toothpaste and McDonald’s Ketchup packets.
One of the maxims of business: If you need something done, give it to a busy
person.
We have no idea where he finds the time, but Joe M. Turner should always be
our first source on virtually all magic information. He is the proverbial busy
person performing shows, giving lectures, making public appearances, teaching
magic, writing articles of interest to both magicians and the rest of the
population.
Frankly, just listing the activities have made us tired — but a
good kind of tired.
When we wrote about the upcoming production on the life, mystery, and death
of Chung Ling Soo, we knew there was more to the story.
The show will make begin
its run at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in August and has already received the
kind of good press you rarely receive in advance of an opening.
So what was the secret behind the mystery of Chung Ling Soo? How could a
theater group of non-magicians put on a show about one of our more enigmatic
legends that included the performance of magic effects? There had to be a
magician involved somewhere, we just knew it.
It turns out; Mr. Turner worked as a magic advisor to the show during its
formation in the Atlanta area.
Sure, that makes sense. Mr. Turner has plenty of spare time on his hands.
Why
there must be six or seven wasted hours in his itinerary each fiscal quarter he
could dedicate towards teaching and advising a theater group.
Emory professor, magic performer and lover of all things magic, Dr. Stuart
Zola, recommended Mr. Turner to the play’s director Adam Koplan.
Mr. Turner was
able to arrange his schedule to attend rehearsals, provide instruction, and
coach the performers in the proper presentation of magic tricks.
Let’s go off on a tangent/rant: We’ve loved the notion of television, motion
pictures, and even the legitimate theater. We think it is the kind of
entertainment that will inevitably replace radio and GAF View-Masters.
But when
a magician performed his act on the radio, we were entranced. Even though we
could not see Mandrake or Dunninger, we watched with our mind’s eye.
Magic came
to the more visual media and outside of magic shows presented by real magicians,
it became an embarrassment.
Is there anything worse than an actor performing as a magician? We realize
the obvious conflict with Robert-Houdin’s famous axiom but we think he really
meant, “a magician is a magician who is an actor playing the role of a
magician.”
If Mr. Robert-Houdin lived to see Greg Brady perform the Crystal Silk
Cylinder on the seventh season of the Brady Bunch, or David Cassidy levitating
the already gossamer-light Susan Dey on the Partridge Family, he would likely
have placed his head beneath his Light/Heavy Box and asked for full-power.
So here is the truth.There are spin-offs of the now-emasculated Napster peer-to-peer file sharing system that have so far scooted under the radar.
Kazaa, Morpheus, eDonkey and WINMX have all set-up what is called ?true p2p systems.?Napster
incurred the wrath of the recording industry but also the penalties of
the Federal Copyright law because it was more than just a way of people
getting together to share files.
Napster actually kept some of the files transferred and was, therefore, more involved in the illegal acts.
These more recent entries in the peer to peer network are less-centralized than Napster.By using the software, you can open all or a part of your personal computer?s hard drive to the internet.
Your
directory is included in the files other computer users can search and
if you have a file they would like, it can be downloaded from your disk
to theirs.
The Government?s shut-down of Napster didn?t really bother us.It was at best a wink-and-a-nod skirting of the law to steal music files.We don?t listen to much music and certainly not to music we haven?t purchased.
We
read, however, that these newest systems were making the transfer or
illegal copying of non-music files just as easy as downloading a
bootleg version of Christmas with Jim Neighbors.
“On March 23rd, 1918, in front of the usual packed house in London’s Wood
Green Empire, something went dramatically wrong. The bullets were fired as
usual, but the magician fell to the ground. With a gasp, he cried: ‘My God, I’ve
been shot. Lower the curtain.’”
The Scotsman (UK)
writes this morning of a new play to premiere this August in Edinburgh based on
the life and death of William Robinson a/k/a Chung Ling Soo. The writers and
producers of the play were hesitant to reveal their solution to the mysterious
and tragic death of the enigmatic performer.
Adam Koplan is the director of The Flying Carpet theater group: “I don’t want
to give too much away, but certainly the show will reveal that the truth really
is stranger than fiction.”
Chung Ling Soo was killed when his right lung was pierced by a single
projectile fired from one of the two rifles (the article mistakenly says pistols
were used). This ended the career of Mr. Robinson but began decades of
investigation into the reason and/or cause for his death.
The story has particular resonance for Scots as Mr. Robinson claimed to be
born of the Robinson and Campbell clans (on his father’s side) and a Cantonese
mother. Even this lineage was a facade. Mr. Robinson was actually born of
Scottish parents and had no ties to China beyond his willingness to swipe the
persona and effects of an authentic Oriental magician, Ching Ling Foo.
Houdini’s The Miracle Mongers noted the relationship between Chung
Ling Soo and Ching Ling Foo in Chapter Five:
Although seldom presenting it in his recent performances, Ching Ling
Foo is a fire-eater of the highest type, refining the effect with the same
subtle artistry that marks all the work of this super-magician.
Of Foo’s thousand imitators the only positively successful one was William E.
Robinson, whose tragic death while in the performance of the bullet-catching
trick is the latest addition to the long list of casualties chargeable to that
ill-omened juggle. He carried the imitation even as far as the name, calling
himself Chung Ling Soo. Robinson was very successful in the classic trick of
apparently eating large quantities of cotton and blowing smoke and sparks from
the mouth. His teeth were finally quite destroyed by the continued performance
of this trick
You gotta love the description of the deadly trick, “that ill-omened
juggle.”
Mr. Kopland claims to have read several books on the life and mysterious
death of Mr. Robinson but, unfortunately, there is no mention of Jim
Steinmeyer’s outstanding new biography, The Glorious Deception: The Double
Life of William Robinson, aka Chung… Continue reading Chung Ling Soo Comes to Life on Stage
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