When I first began performing magic professionally, and for well over a decade after, I worked exclusively as a close-up magician. The stage held no attraction to me because I had never seen a stage performance match the impact and entertainment of a great close-up performance.
Four years ago, I launched my first stage show and soon we will be launching the third major overhaul. Today I’m taking a moment to reflect on that journey and why I waited so long to break into stage magic. For the longest time I believed that stage magic could never be as strong as close-up magic, and every stage show I saw seemed to confirm this. In my experience, the chief advantages of close-up magic over a typical stage show are:
- It’s interactive – When you’re watching good close-up magic, it’s an engaging experience. You’re not a passive audience member, you’re an integral part of the show. As a result, the performance is a co-creation between the audience and the magician.
- It doesn’t involve a bunch of contraptions (usually) - Most stage illusion shows involve the magician wheeling on a ‘magic box’, doing a ‘trick’ and then wheeling it off only to replace it with another one. A modern audience knows that the secret is hidden inside the custom built device and that they, too, could perform that trick if they had the device and had read the instructions.Good close-up magic, however, can be performed with whatever happens to be around at the time. It’s true that some magicians carry around a bag of props, but a talented close-up magician can entertain a crowd with any props or magical apparatus whatsoever.
- You’re right there! – When you’re watching a stage magic show, you might be 50 or 100 feet away. When you’re watching close-up magic, you’re inches away. Over and over, my audiences have told me how much more impressive they found magic happening in close proximity
Years ago I decided that, if I could not create a stage magic show that was as entertaining and amazing as my close-up magic, then I would not perform on stage. For many years, I did not. If someone wanted to hire me for a stage show, I directed them elsewhere.
In 2006 I began working on bringing all the qualities of Close-up magic onto the stage. It was not an easy process, and it had a lot of dead ends, but the debut was a resounding success and my first–and subsequent–client performances earned standing ovations.
Life, art, and magic are eternally works in progress. The show evolves after every performance and occasionally I will rework or rewrite large chunks of the show; usually after devising better methods for the existing routines, or replacing routines with better creations. As I mentioned above, I’m nearing the end of my third major revision. Looking at the changes we’ve made is very exciting! The show is the best it has ever been, the comedy more refined, the magic even more astonishing and the production values are way up. Compared to the show we created 4 years ago, it’s night and day.
It’s important, especially in this business, to be constantly improving. Too often performers put together a decent show and rest on their laurel’s. The greatest artists and performers continue to innovate, continue to improve and live by the axiom “The enemy of the best is the good.”
