Fifteen year-old Nick Brice had an exceptional view of the overflow crowd gathered beneath him on the hot asphalt parking lot of the Swift Current Mall.
The excited, curious, and skeptical over-flow audience had an equally fine vantage point to watch the young man struggle with the canvas straight jacket as he swayed and writhed in the 10 mile-per-hour winds dangling some 40 feet above last Saturday.
No straight jacket escape is automatic or easy.
But Nick Brice was not looking for “easy” when he agreed to perform the dangerous stunt.
If he wanted to be safe, or to perform an “easy” escape, he would have stayed planted on terra firma (likely indoors), donned a heavily gimmicked, unexamined straight jacket, and conducted his escape behind an opaque curtain.
Perhaps it is a tribute to his youthful energy and enthusiasm that he was able to fend off fatigue and vertigo to slowly and painfully work his way free of the weighty garment before he would have certainly collapsed from heat exhaustion and his inverted position.
Like many of us, Mr. Brice was inspired by Houdini – someone who never took the “easy” route.
“Probably the most famous magician, Harry Houdini, is the one that really inspires me. He was the first one to do this one at the turn of the 20 century. He was my inspiration to do the straight jacket escape,” Master Brice told reporters.
His usual performance venues are more stable, less dangerous.
“I have done a couple at the library. Actually I normally do it at schools. I am always entertaining the other kids at high school.”
How does he intend to top his latest public exhibition next year?
There are very few in our society who receive and devour magazines and catalogs featuring the very latest in leather tethers, handcuffs, stocks, chains, and leg irons without making it on some government list.
Magicians and legitimate law enforcement are about the only folks who have an excuse for this interest.
We don’t pass judgment on the others who receive such reading material on a monthly basis; but are also careful to avoid passing their house at night or upsetting them in any way.
Scarlett was known as “The Princess of Magic” when she performed a family-friendly afternoon show that ran six days a week in Planet Hollywood’s V Theater. Her act has a new home and a very different name.
We suppose a show featuring a beautiful redhead and topless female assistants could be family-friendly but probably not the kind of family you would want to live near.
While Scarlett studied dance for ten years and is no stranger to the stage, she entered the world of magic just a few years ago.
Working first as an assistant to Reno magician Jon Andrew and then his student, Scarlett made her Las Vegas debut last August.
She received high marks from the V Theater’s show producer, David Saxe.
Mr. Saxe knows something about magic and female magicians. His sister is Inside Magic favorite Melinda Saxe.
“She totally reminds me of my sister,” says Saxe, who produced Melindafor 16 years as well as the all-female “Showgirls of Magic” at the San Remo (now Hooters hotel). “She has a presence I like.”
Saxe was impressed with her eagerness to learn and to get her career going, not taking the usual path of becoming a specialty act.
“It was a little aggressive of her to start off with a full show, but that’s the way Melinda did it in 1987.
Magician and inventor Jacob Spinney filed suit against Criss Angel on June 8, 2009 claiming Mr. Angel renigned on a promise to pay for rights to Spinney’s Chair Self-Levitation, Spinney’s Chair Self-Suspension and Spinney’s Fork-Bending gimmicks.
Mr. Spinney filed his eight-count complaint against Criss Angel in Nassau County, New York, home of Angel Productions, Incorporated.
According to the complaint, in 2004, Mr. Angel asked Murphy’s Magic Supplies for ”illusions or magical effects” to be used in this upcoming MindFreak television series.
Murphy’s referred Criss Angel to teenage inventor Jacob Spinney. The two spoke, and Angel offered Spinney a position as “Magic Consultant” on the upcoming series.
Silvio Berlusconi, Italy’s Prime Minister, is under attack for allegedly maintaining a “harem.”
Mr. Berlusconi is a billionaire, runs most of the Italian media and is married.
According to news reports this morning, the Prime Minister engaged in extra-marital relations with former assistant to illusionist David Copperfield, Patrizia D’Addario.
Ms. D’Addario was paid to attend an elegant dinner party at the leader’s home. He apparently offered fine food, gifts, and requested she stay after other guest left.
Normally, this would be a he said – she said situation. Ms. D’Addario, however, taped their conversation. The tape seems to prove up her claim and paint the Prime Minister in a tawdry light.
At breakfast the following morning, Berlusconi presented her with a “multicoloured tortoise encrusted with precious stones, declaring: ‘The tortoise is a special gift I give only to you.’”
When reports of Mr. Berlusconi’s alleged infidelity first surfaced, he dismissed them generally. After Ms. D’Addario’s claims were made public, he called them “trash and falsehood.”
“I will not be swayed by these attacks and will continue to work for the good of the country,” he said.
Fifteen year-old Nick Brice had an exceptional view of the overflow crowd gathered beneath him on the hot asphalt parking lot of the Swift Current Mall.
There are very few in our society who receive and devour magazines and catalogs featuring the very latest in leather tethers, handcuffs, stocks, chains, and leg irons without making it on some government list.
Magician and inventor 
Silvio 
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