The interntational Gala Show marks the end of the Blackpool Convention, Adrian Walsh was the compare for the evening, a huge improvement over saturdays ‘mc’!!
Mahka Tendo opened the first half of the show with his traditional card manipulation act, although many people say that his act is slightly boring after a while, the sheer number of cards, and the large card productions (mainly the number he managed to hold and pull out) keeps my interest. It was a good strong start to the show. Rafael followed with his comedy dove act (which I saw at FISM in stockholm). To be honest I thought his act on Saturday night in the show was much better than this show, although both were great, I found the previous nights much more interesting. He finished with a very effective Bird to Assistant illusion.
Every gala show has a juggler, it’s part of the tradition of the show I guess, and in true style, the juggler always steals the show. Antje Pode performed her foot juggling routine juggling suitcases, balls and hand bags with her feet while lying on her back.
Scott & Muriel where up next and it wasn’t really a great slot. The lack of a working mic when Muriel was doing her singing routine, and a chair-suspension illusion which saw Scott coming crashing down to the floor embarassingly exposing the ‘workings’ of the illusions didn’t help. For a ‘FISM world champions’ act it was very poor.
David Sousa performed his FISM card act, with appearing envelopes and letters, pulling the show back into an air of quality, and was followed by quick change artist Valerie. Although the changes were good and quick, the sectioned between them were not, and her floating / suspended legs illusion suffered badly from bad angles and not really fitting into a quick change section.
Topas, who I always think is just the best act when I see him, closed the first half with appearing speakers act, a box was shown empty and many speakers were removed from the box (each one the size of the box itself), plugged in and placed on stage. I liked the build up from a simple sound track to a full on energy track as the speakers were produced and started playing. Topas is a fantastic act, and except a little over acting by the stand hands lifting the speakers, it was a strong close to the first half and beat the normal type of tired illusion acts that close the shows.
After the interval the Award ceremony part of the show started, this is traditionally a little dull, but heralds the better acts. It was great to see Geoffrey Durham get the Murray Award for services to magic. The award for Worlds Children’s Entertainer, and the Ken Dodd Comedy Award were also all given out, both going to John Kimmons from the UK. It would have been nice, if those giving the award had known which award was which though!!!
Blackpool Magicians Club honorary life president, Ken Dodd followed with his normal humor, which probably only really registered with the British part of the audience, and was actually quite funny (I normally don’t enjoy the Ken Dodd section) and he only did about 20 minutes as opposed to the few hours in previous years!!
The world youngest illusionists The Yamagami Brothers were on next, When I first saw these two perform they were very young (about 5) and they seamlessly did illusions and magic, and seemed to have great energy, throwing themselves around the stage. They seemed to lack that energy this time, and although the act was good (especially given their ages), it has lost something for me personally. However it was good, and they did some clever illusions and substitutions.
Unfortunately Scott & Muriel came back for a second attempt at a set, giving us a dismal act of pure stupidity. Adults running round the stage dressed up as pantomime horses when from bizarre, to ridiculous to cringe worthy as they got Balckpool President, Harry Greenaway up on stage dressed in a large cactus suite, while they shot guns and flicked whips at him to burst a balloon, and ended up with a ‘comedy’ dropping of Harrys pants gag (hilarious.. not!) Muriel inflicted more pain on the audience by passing in front of the speakers giving up a ear bleeding feedback scream not once but twice. It’s a shame stages don’t have working trap doors any more..
Strangely, the acts from the first half started to re-appear in the second.. Topas did another set based around his ‘childhood memories’, producing and vanishing balls, rocking horses, and included a nice animated teddy bear at the end. Like everything Topas does, it was beautifully presented, polished and honed, and maybe just because of the previous ‘act’ the audience gave Topas a great reception.
The normal thank the organisers, crew etc now followed before Shimada took the stage. He performed his traditional parasol and dragon act, a great fitting end to the show. It was fast, tight, and many items were produced quickly and cleanly. a few pyro’s and smoke effects heralded the appearance of two large chinese dragon type performers, and in a fight to the death, a neat switch of Shimada and his assistant was achieved.
The show itself clocked in at about 3 hours and 25 minutes, much shorted than previous years, and to be honest it was just around the right length. I woudl have liked to have seen maybe a patter act, or comedy act. Noel Britten with his water bucket escape would have gone down a storm given the previous nights issues with the water torture escape. Even giving Justin Lee Collins, doing his Justin Illusion act would have been a great one!
In all a good show, brought down slightly by the odd ‘off’ act and technical issue.
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