This week we welcome in the amazing Brad Weston. He tells us about his interest in the variety arts at a young age and describes some of his first street shows at a zoo.
We learn about clown college, a school for comedia del arte and the differences between the two. Brad also tells us about how one contract at a theme park allowed him to move his whole family. A great conversation that comes on the heels of first appearance at the Moisture Festival.
Recently I was performing at an outdoor event where it dumped rain all day. My stage was covered so that was nice, but getting around the event I was frequently getting soaked. This the glamourous side of show biz:
In between shows I would go to my dressing room to dry off my socks and shoes so that I’d be comfortable at my next show! There’s nothing worse them stepping onstage and having something like wet shoes bug you. No one in the audience can see the discomfort, but it’s something that takes you mentally out of the show.
Keeping yourself comfortable in the show is important!
I’m a little bit late on this thinking as it’s May and Easter was weeks ago, but I’m surprised that no one is making Easter Peeps as sponges for the sponge ball/bunny trick. The make total sense and the marshmallow has a sponge like visual texture.
If you didn’t want to do a traditional “in their hands” style vanish and productions, you could use them more like multiplying bananas. They’re topical, visual and really wouldn’t take any additional skill to learn if you already do the bananas.
They really wouldn’t be hard to make a mold of, assuming the ingredients in the Peeps don’t have a bad reaction with the mold material. For me this is a deep back burner project, maybe I’ll get to it by next easter…
Currently I do several shows for different venues or audiences. Each of these shows has its own case, however there are some props that I only have one of, so I need to move that prop from case to case. I’m in the process of building or acquiring the multiples of that prop.
While I was putting the remote controls into the Applause Please V2‘s that I’m building, I wired up a second alarm clock with a remote control.
I use this prop in my Incredible Idioms school assembly show and in my general kid show. By not having to move it from case to case, it saves me time and I don’t have to worry about it not being in the case!
If you do multiple shows, having a dedicated case and props really saves a lot of time as there’s no packing to do the show, just grab the case and go!
I don’t know why, but I’ve been fascinated by the Phoenix Ace move. I don’t know the official name of the move but this is the one where you have a multiple cards held as one and you palm off the stack leaving one card visible. I think it’s really more of a stage more, but I’m trying to come up with uses for it where you’re palming off of the deck.
One I’m playing with uses an outjogged double card that’s in the middle of the deck. Another one is this one below:
I don’t think this is something I’d ever really do, but it’s fun to play with. I think that maybe if I keep playing, something useful will happen with the move.
I’m currently finishing up making a few Applause Please V2. These will be completely remote control, so you don’t need to plug them into a wall outlet.
I had the boxes made by Brian Cook Magic Crafter and they look great!
Originally I was against going full remote control as the parts can be hard to replace if something breaks when you’re travelling. However, after enough people had been asking me about it over the years and me finally starting to make some for friends and one for me I’m convinced this is the way to go.
I’ve been using the fully remote controlled one I made for myself since late 2019 and it’s still working great!
I’m still working through the JP Vallarino book. It’s all card magic, which I’m fine with. The book for me had an early hit with his Hypnotic Rumba Count, which I really liked, but then the next few things were pretty redundant and just variations on things. For example his take on the Elmsley Count was basically a style thing and while style is important and important to how he performs, it’s not really actionable information for me.
In the book, the Optical Center Steal is something I’ve done since I was a teenager, and while I came up with it on my own, it’s something that I just assumed was common knowledge. I guess it’s not.
The Revolutionary Control I think gets its name from the rolling action the cards make, and not that it’s a “game changer”. This is another example of a variation, I think Harry Lorayne had a control that was very similar to this.
I’m just wrapping up the section on card sleights, and getting into the tricks. I’m hoping that there will be some more stuff that interests me in it!
The other day my wife said I should try wearing vests when I perform. I happened to have one from a suit, so I gave it a try at a show:
I’m not totally sold on the idea of wearing a vest when I perform. I think I need something that’s a bit fancier (?) than this one, or one that visually pops a bit more. I think the outfit I tried makes me look like a waiter. Maybe I should add some piping that’s a different color?
Whether or not I continue down the vest path, the important thing is that I tried something new…
The other day I popped into my social media and it suggested I be friends with this guy. He’s rocking the “Yellowface” to do the linking rings. This a super lazy presentation approach, and definitely not a modern one. He puts on the outfit to do the Linking Rings.
Let’s take a step back and look at him trying to honor Asian culture. He didn’t do any research on it. There’s no evidence that the lining rings came from china (source: Genii online). So aside from the rings being from China, why is he wearing the clothes? Based on this article which reviews him doing the rings, I can’t find any reason why he’s wearing that robe in his presentation. I hope he wasn’t using any of the “I learned this from a great Chinsese magician…Fu Ling Yu” lines.
We as magicians need to move past this sort of stuff. You can do the Linking Rings without putting on robes.
I will say that I do have an out of context view of what’s happening as I’m just seeing a facebook picture, however the article I read seems to confirm what I’m thinking. In my heart, I hope he’s doing a thought out presentation that’s respectful…
Sometimes the universe hands you something fun. I was cleaning the office and found a set of Gary Freed’s NFW card trick. This is a great trick where four jokers turn into four aces. The provided routine is alright, and when I was younger and working at Market Magic Shop in Seattle I developed a better handling for it that was much better looking than what was in the instructions.
When I found the NFW set last night I immediately recognized that JP Vallarino’s Hypnotic Rumba Count would work really well with the NFW card set!
Using the rumba count makes this a very direct change of four jokers to four aces! I think this would make a great trick for a preshow video as it’s simple, direct and a good trick!
