They say the hand is quicker than the eye. And it is at Theatre of Magic. This magic show now playing weekly at Rydge’s, Fortitude Valley, and twice a month at The Empire Theatre in Toowoomba, demonstrates that old adage perfectly.
Growing up my favourite magician was Tommy Cooper, the English comedian whose tricks always went wrong. But nothing goes wrong at Theatre of Magic or, if it does, the audience is so bamboozled they don’t notice it.
The show features three magicians. There’s former Vegas headliner Christopher Wayne. He conquered Vegas with his then showbiz partner Mike Tyler as The Naked Magicians. That show was famous and was a mix of comedy and magic delivered as the duo slowly disrobed during the show.
It premiered in 2014 at the Brisbane Comedy Festival. As well as Vegas they performed in the UK, elsewhere in the US, Canada and Hong Kong.
I should point out that at Theatre of Magic everyone keeps their kit on, which is probably just as well since it’s an intimate show. And that’s the beauty. We get to see the magic close up, so close that you think we might see how it is done. But we don’t. Therein lies the magic … and the fun.
Wayne’s partners in magic are Australia’s Got Talent finalist Josh Norbido, one of Australia’s best close-up and sleight of hand artists, and comedy legend The Amazing Nigel. I’m not sure if he was christened Amazing Nigel but that’s how we know him. I did see him perform when I attended an earlier iteration of this show in another venue.
Upstairs at the current venue they perform in a room that is both big enough and small enough. And it was full the Saturday night we attended. We ran into some people we knew, who were curious. In fact, one friend said she had never been to a magic show before. I contacted her after the show and she said she loved it.
I went with my wife, who is not a huge magic fan, either, but she loved it too. What’s going on? Everyone loved it, actually. The 90 minutes just whizzed by. For me that’s something because I’m often at shows looking at my watch. Not at this one.
The magicians tend to rotate with only two performing each night while the third acts as MC. That was Nigel this time, who I saw perform the first time I attended. He did something rather amazing with a newspaper that night.
Wayne is dapper and funny and tells a lovely story about how his grandfather got him interested in magic in Brisbane when he was a boy. He then proceeds to dazzle us with tricks involving a couple of little red balls and follows that up with some card and other tricks.
Norbido followed after a brief interval with some amazing card tricks and, again, we had no idea how he did what he did. Audience participation is very much part of this show and normally that would make me cringe. But even I get into the spirit of things when Norbido managed to retrieve a card I had chosen from thin air. My wife also got in the spirit of things and we each took home the playing card we had chosen as a memento.
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The skill of these magicians is incredible. Raymond Joseph Teller, one half of world-famous American magic act Penn & Teller (who recently played a season at QPAC) attended Theatre of Magic on a night off and was, as I understand it, very impressed.
In fact, these magicians even impress each other and watch on with glee. Is it possible they don’t even know how their colleague is doing it?
We certainly couldn’t figure it out and therein lies the magic. Theatre of Magic is such a fun night out and so refreshingly entertaining. These guys don’t need bells and whistles or technology. They use traditional techniques and, like I said, the hand is quicker (a lot quicker) than the eye.
Theatre of Magic is suitable for ages 10+; $69 to $89 for VIP seating; theatreofmagic.com.au