The second day of the Pacific Coast Association of Magicians convention started out with James Cielen’s talk about performing on cruise ships.
James’s talk was a great insight into what it takes to consistantly be working on cruise ships.
Then it was a break for lunch, which was hosted by Henry Tom.
After lunch was the stage contest. I was recruited to be a judge, so I couldn’t watch for fun, I had to watch for “work”. Lots of great acts! One of the acts produced two live fish! These weren’t gold fish, they were about 10ish inches long and were FISH!
This week I’m lecturing and performing at the Pacific Coast Association of Magicians (PCAM) convention aboard the Holland America ship, the Eurodam. I got into Canada the day before the cruise. With the extra day in the Vancouver BC area, I went to see Shawn Farquhar’s Hidden Wonders show!
Shawn’s show is great and it’s a really smart format. It’s not a rigid show, and they way it’s presented makes it feel fresh for the audience.
Then a bunch of the magicians who were in town the night before the convention all went out to hang out!
That brings us to day one of the convention. This year’s PCAM convention is on the cruise ship Eurodam. Before I got onto the ship, I had breakfast with Paul Romhany and Peter Samuelson.
Paul isn’t attending the convention, so it was nice to see him.
Boarding the ship was a potential problem for me as I had my show with me, but I wasn’t a guest entertainer hired by the ship. That means they didn’t have to let me bring any props onboard that they objected to. I really lucked out. I have a whip and that’s the prop I was worried about getting taken away.
I got really lucky, the x-ray screener saw the whip and told the person next to her that I had she thought I had a whip. The second person took my case and handed it to a third person and said, “He has a wire“. The third person opened the case and and saw a coiled up power cord and said, “is this the wire?” I said, “yes” and they closed my case and let me proceed.
Now that I was on the ship with all of my gear I could relax a little bit.
The opening event for the convention was James Cielen‘s show.
We were supposed to see his show in the main theater as part of the cruise, but his schedule shifted, so he did a show just for us. The show he did was close up magic that was projected onto a screen. It was a solid choice of material and I it was great to see what a full close up show for a theater looks like.
The next two events were presented by Daniel Garcia.
He performed a close-up show, a Q&A session, and a lecture. His material is great, and he did a great job explaining why he does things the way he does.
I picked up his One Card, which is a great way to do a named card in envelope.
That took us to about 11 pm, and it was time for me to go to bed.
Today is day two, which has the close up and stage contests. James Cielen has a Q&A about working on cruises, and my lecture is tonight. It’ll be a full day, and I’ll probably need to take a nap or two to make it through.
I just started reading the book Openers. This book is a compilation of “openers” for magic shows. The book is mostly close up openers so far, but I’m only about 1/3 into the book.
So far my favorites are: Virus by John Guastaferro: This is a full deck, all backs routine where one side then turns blank, then to normal playing card faces. It’s not too hard to do. I like the routine, however I think I’d need to find a new theme for it. His theme is great, just not for me.
Contender by Liam Montier: This is a quick trick where you know which card someone is thinking of. I think this is a great “bar bet” style of trick.
I should also mention that I’ve been hunting for chop cup routines that don’t use a table and there’s one in this book called The Gold Cup Con by Carl Royle. It’s a close up routine using a small chop cup that will hold a golf ball. It’s a great routine, just not for what I’m personally trying to do with a chop cup.
The next step in switching to a handheld microphone has happened!
I just bought a Sennheiser handheld microphone that’s compatible with my Sennheiser ew G4 receiver. That saved me having to buy a new receiver. Also I still get the benefits of a smaller and battery operated camera mount receiver, which I prefer of the larger plug in style receivers.
Another advantage of switching to a handheld mic for my main show is that most venues already them, so I don’t need to bring my own for many gigs!
Years ago when I was out there doing comedy one nighters, I learned that we’re really getting paid for the travel.
For example, when I do local gigs I’ve started to charge more if my travel involves rush hour traffic.
I should say that I try to not be in a rush to a gig. If I have a gig that would involve me sitting in traffic, I’ll actually leave a couple hours early and get close to the gig. Then I’ll work out at a gym, or go to a coffee shop and do some work. These are things that I’d normally do during my day, I’m just taking back the 45 minutes I’d be sitting in traffic.
Trying to never be in a rush has really taken a lot of stress out of my life.
A few weeks ago when I was in Utah, one of the acts I worked with was the juggler Charles Peachock. He’s into haunted houses and we went to a few of them with some of the other acts at the event.
I think the last time I went to a haunted house was thirty years ago.
We went to two haunted houses over two nights. Here’s what I learned, I preferred the haunted houses where the actors weren’t there to just jump out at you, but they were there to help the story move along.
What does that say about a magic show?
A show with some sort of a story or through line is probably something that I’d prefer over a collection of tricks. Now thinking about my show, there’s not really a through line in the show, but it’s more that a collection of tricks. Each routine tells you a bit more about me, however I’m thinking I need to start thinking of more of a through line for my show.
In a week I’m heading out to the 2025 PCAM convention to do my full show and a lecture. If you can’t make it, you can get the lecture notes from me!
2025 Lecture Notes .pdf $25
These are the lecture notes from the lecture that I will present at the 2025 PCAM magic convention. They focus is on stand up/stage magic. They contain seven tricks/routines and five essays.
Introduction
The Opener Card Routine: The five-minute card routine that Louie does as my warm-up for family audiences!
Developing a Unique Show
Louie Foxx’s Take Out Box (Two Versions!): Turn a Chinese food take-out box into a production box!
Moving the Sponge Ball Down the Field
The Fortune Teller: A folded paper fortune teller becomes a self-contained prediction system!
Process in Magic and Mentalism
The Body Language Book Test: A book test plays BIG!
Can I tell that joke?
The Cracker Card Trick: A card trick using crackers! This was performed by Louie TV’s Masters of Illusion!
Fiat Currency: An opening effect that explains what you do.
Why You Should Hang Out With Magicians
The Stand Up Chop Cup: A chop chop routine that uses no table and no one from the audience!
48 pages These are a .pdf that will be emailed to you within 24 hours of placing your order.
In the October issue of Vanish Magazine I’m teaching the Stand Up Chop Cup routine that I’ve been doing this summer. I wrote about this routine a little bit ago, it was created with rules.
Those rules were pretty simple:
1: No table: I don’t work behind a table, and didn’t want to add one just for a chop cup. Also, when on a raised stage, it can created a visibility issue for people seated on the floor below you.
2: No openly going to the pockets(or case): I think that if you constantly go to your pockets or prop case, it’s not hard for the audience to backtrack where the large production item came from. Sure they may not know how you got it there, but they know where it came from.
3: No one from the audience onstage: The chop cup really doesn’t need a spectator onstage…especially if their only job is to let you use their hands as a table. It’s a lot of dead time to bring someone on and off stage, and most chop cup routines don’t justify that.
Oh, I guess I should mention that this is a platform/stage routine and not a close up routine. I wanted to be able to do this as a solo piece onstage and the reason that I created it was there wasn’t anything that fit all three of those rules.
One of my bad habits is that I talk too fast. I do this on and off stage, but I’m really trying to correct it onstage. A while ago I started a run of shows with a cold. This was a longer run of 10 days and I was already there when I noticed I was getting sick. I did my best to not socialize off stage with the other acts and switched the show to one that really has no contact with the audience.
One thing I immediately noticed was that I slowed my rate of speech a lot. I’m guessing this was due to my breathing being different with a cold. I also noticed that all the jokes were hitting harder. I was giving people just a little bit more time to process the set ups and punchlines.
I need to keep up talking slower, but when it’s my natural way of speaking it’s a challenge. I’m working hard on keeping it slow…
