A Simple Way to Reduce Distractions at Outdoor Magic Shows

bubbles in a magic show

One of the things that I hate when performing at fairs is the vendors that sell bubble guns. People will give them to a toddler, and the kid will just sit there and shoot bubbles the whole show. This is a HUGE distraction.

Not only is it a distraction, but the bubbles can also get on my glasses and smudge them (which is super annoying) or my props.

How Do I Politely Get Them To Stop?

Here’s what I started doing when there’s a kid with a bubble gun at my show: I say (on mic), “No bubbles during the show, I’m allergic to the detergent in them”

That’s it, super direct and simple. Sure, it’s a lie; however, it tells them that not everyone wants bubbles blown into their face. It also gives a reason they might not have thought of for why they’re being inconsiderate by letting their kid spray bubbles everywhere.

Give them a reason for the request and they’ll (usually) follow it.

-Louie

The Moisture Festival Podcast – Paul Magid – part 3

On this episode of the Moisture Festival Podcast, we finish up our conversation with Karamazov Brother Paul Magid. We dive into stories about living with Ken Kesey, opening for the Grateful Dead, crashing their bus into Jerry Garcia’s car, and how they ended up on an episode of Seinfeld.

Paul talks about some of his favorite achievements and shares some of his most memorable bad shows. We also learn about how one of their most famous routines, “the gamble,” was created. A great wrap-up for one of the most famous modern vaudevillians.

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Easy App Magic Trick without a Magic App!

It’s no secret that while I have used phone based app magic, I’m not a huge fan of them. They are frequently abandoned by the creator once sales slow down or are affected by a lack of internet connectivity. Recently, I posted about a trick with my phone that doesn’t go the traditional magic app route. Here’s what the first version of the trick looked like:

The first version needed some double lifts, which is fine, but I learned they are totally unnecessary. There’s no reason to have them, and they could be eliminated with a slight adjustment. Taking them out, really streamlined the trick, and the adjustment allows me to do it with a borrowed deck!

This is a good example of looking at a trick and trying to improve it past the “it works” phase to make it work better!

-Louie

Performing on National TV!

Doing a national news spot can be very challenging when doing magic. A while ago, I wrote a post about doing them with some behind the scenes video. One of the biggest challenges is how fluid they can be. With magic, it’s fairly easy to be prepared with a couple of tricks that run different lengths of time.

Recently I did a national news spot at a gig where I was doing my street organ. This is a bit more challenging for a news spot. I was told we’d have 30 seconds, so the reporter, producer and I planned the bit and here’s how it came out:

Unforeseen Challenges of Performing on Live Television!

Those 30 seconds ended up being over a minute! I was rushing because I thought we didn’t have much time. I was also getting a weird vibe from the reporter and wasn’t sure what to make of it. In my past experience, the weird vibe means we have to wrap up. After we finished, he mentioned he lost the audio in his earpiece, so he didn’t know how we were doing on time. We both were kinda flying blind!

Given the situation it turned out well.

-Louie

Is the Three Shell Game Relevant?

Not too long ago, a magician I was hanging out with said he didn’t think that younger people understood or knew what the shell game is. I disagree; I think young people know what the three shell game is, and my reasoning is that every ballpark in the USA plays a version of it on the jumbotron. Here’s the shell game at a Cincinnati Reds game:

It’s a simple concept of a game, and younger people definitely know what it is, or it wouldn’t be played in stadiums! This is one of the things that I like about it, it IS RELATABLE because people have played it before!

-Louie

Should You Wear Sunglasses Onstage?

I wrapped up twelve days of performing my Vintage Organ at a state fair. This is very different than performing magic. The booker didn’t want a show, but something more ambient, like a stilt walker. You have interactions with people, but you’re there to create a vibe, not do a show.

When I started doing the Vintage Organ, my costume (outdoors) had me wearing sunglasses. That was intentional; it was so that I could look around and not look bored or distracted.

The sunglasses do their job of making it harder to tell how mentally engaged you are. However, the drawback is that people don’t want to engage you as eagerly as if they could see your eyes. You lose how you initially connect with people. If I took my sunglasses off and just wore my normal glasses, the percentage of people who would approach me versus me calling out to them was higher.

Whenever I see stage magicians or jugglers wear sunglasses, I always wonder why they’re wearing them. They are cutting off how humans initially connect with each other…eye contact!

-Louie

“Weird Al” Yankovic: Bigger & Weirder 2026 Tour

Yesterday I wrote about Puddles Pity Party, who was the opener for “Weird Al” Yankovic, and today I’m writing about “Weird Al”. He’s an example of giving 110% onstage! He’s 66 years old, and you couldn’t tell it by how he performed; he’s got more energy than some magicians I’ve seen in their 20s.

The show was interesting as there was a lot of prerecorded video that played for decent chunks of time. The videos were fun and/or funny and used to cover up costume changes. I remember the first time I saw David Copperfield, he showed a video of one of the big tricks from a TV special right before his closing trick (flying), which I’m assuming was for a similar reason to Weird Al.

Like Puddles Pity Party, the main video screen at the back of the stage was used to enhance what was onstage, and it did a great job of that. He played clips of videos he was parodying at one point. I think that was an excellent use of the screen for comedic effect.

For me a HUGE takeaway was that everyone looked like they were having an amazing time onstage and that energy carried out to the audience.

In the show, there were two musicians behind Weird Al who were frequently on camera. They looked like they were having a better time than the audience. I think I figured out what carried the fun further out into the audience: they weren’t smiling with their lips, they were smiling with their mouths. What I mean by that is they were doing smiles with their mouths open a bit.

The next day, for all of my shows, I started smiling with my mouth, and it made a huge difference! I’ve written in the past about smiling onstage, however sometimes a reminder is great!

Go out there and put your heart into your art and smile!

-Louie

Puddles Pity Party

Last week while I was in Ohio, I saw Weird Al’s show and the opener was Puddles Pity Party. I’ll write about Weird Al tomorrow, this post is going to be about Puddles. I’m going to start by saying, he was amazing, and if you get a chance to see him, do it!

Puddles Pity Party

His show is what a variety act (magician/juggler/etc) should look like for an arena show (about 10,000 people). He did a show that was all singing; he didn’t speak. In the show, there were gags and audience volunteers. His structure was great: a song or two, then a song that, at the end, went right into him bringing someone up from the audience who did something during a song. Then that patter repeated.

It was interesting that after his song, he had a graphic and recorded tune when he went into the audience. The audience didn’t applaud at the end of the song as he went into the audience. I really liked that approach; it kept the energy up. It wasn’t like a thing ended, but it was an extension of the previous thing. That’s kinda like my current Nest of Envelopes routine.

The use of projection was great in this venue, there was a screen at the back of the stage and two on the sides. The two sides had video projection of him, and the one at the back had graphics/recorded video that played. The graphics or recorded video did a great job of enhancing the mood of the song he was singing.

I highly recommend this show to see what a club style magic show might look like in an arena!

-Louie

Making a Juggling Routine

A few days ago I had an idea for a magic routine, and in that routine there is a juggling element. I can juggle, but am not a juggler and needed to work out a sequence. Luckily, in the performer house that I’m at, there are two jugglers and a physical comedian there. Last night we had a little workshop on the routine!

juggling workshop

I’m a huge fan of workshopping with other performers. It’s a way to get a lot of ideas quickly, or to get expertise that you don’t have. I can juggle, but I don’t know the best way to put together a juggling sequence.

Workshopping with performers who don’t just do magic brings in a lot of different thinking and ideas than just magicians.

-Louie

Magic Trick That Looks Like AI!

Modern magic, especially close up magic has moved to very visual effects. Things that look like AI or if you’re old school, then trick photography. Magicians rarely look to the past, there are some amazing tricks that look like a modern AI fake magic trick.

One example is the Joseph Silk Gun. Another is the Jumbo Card Restoration Frame which was invented by Theo Bamberg in 1909. I’m sharing a greenroom with a magician who has one of these and it looks amazing!

There’s ton’s of really cool stuff from the past that fits modern styles, you just got to search it out!

-Louie