by Hazel Flynn
They provided good exposure, though, and they often drew other magicians who wanted to check out the competition. At one show a performer I’d met at the magic convention in Adelaide was there with his wife. They came up afterwards to say hello and she said to me, ‘You remind me of this little kid who used to do Michael Jackson magic dancing.’ Her husband said, ‘It’s him, grown up.’ It was strange to think how far I’d come in just six years.
In November 2003 I turned twenty-one. The assumption was that my parents would put on a big party for me, as they had for John and Adam. But the more I thought about it, the more I realised how I could improve the act with extra money. So I asked Dad what they had spent on the other parties and the boys’ presents. He told me and I said, ‘Okay, well how about we save the hassle of having a party? Why don’t you just give me the money you would have spent on that and on the present and I’ll use it for some illusions?’ Dad said, ‘Well, hang on, if we don’t have the party then we don’t have to pay for a party.’ I said, ‘Okay, we’ll have the party then, Dad. But even if we don’t hire a venue and have it at home instead, there’ll be all the preparation, and getting the marquee and all the invitations, and the clean-up afterwards . . . Are you sure it wouldn’t be easier just to give me the money?’ Whether I wore him down or he agreed with my logic, my argument won the day. I got the money and put it straight into the act.
As 2004 approached Adam and I identified another market we thought we might be able to break into: cruise ships. There were hundreds of ships out there and each one offered a program of entertainment. We knew from the overseas magic magazines and through the magic community that lots of magicians were working the ships. They weren’t hacks either; in fact, many of the best second-tier performers of the day were doing it because it paid well and the facilities were good: a proper on-board theatre with proper lighting and a stage that could fit large illusions.
We discovered that, as with all the other types of performance venues, the bookings were handled by specialist agencies. We bought a contact book that listed hundreds of them, operating from ports around the world, and compiled impressive packages containing a CD-ROM of the showreel, a special version of the flyer, stills and a sheet with technical specs and contact details to send out to them. Adam and I had the money to pay for all this because we had a policy of pooling everything we earned to use on the act apart from the tiny amount we gave ourselves in ‘wages’ (far less than we’d have earned behind a fast-food counter). But we discovered that even though we’d paid for the listings they weren’t reliable. Many of the packages were going to agencies overseas and the postage alone cost $10 to $15; we couldn’t afford to be sending them to defunct addresses. So Adam spent hour upon hour verifying information via websites and expensive international phone calls.
Despite having limited money to spend, we instinctively understood the importance of presentation. If we wanted our unsolicited material to stand out it had to look slick and professional. We paid to have labels for the CD-ROMs made up and then saved costs by sticking them all on ourselves. From the scores of packages we sent we got only one response, but it was a good one, an agency based in New Jersey whose clients included a large, high-profile shipping line with a well-heeled clientele. We had a call from the agency to say they liked what they’d seen so far but to land a booking I would need two 45-minute halves; did I have that? ‘Absolutely,’ I said. ‘In fact I have three 45-minute sections.’ In reality I had one thirty-minute show but there was no need to tell them that. I knew I could deliver whatever I was asked for. Coming up with ideas has never been my problem. (The resources to make them happen, well, that was sometimes a different matter.)
The agent said great, I was just what they were looking for, they’d like to sign the act and they’d have a booking for me as soon as the paperwork was done. I said calmly that it sounded good and I’d look forward to seeing the contract. Then I hung up and danced around the room like a loon. It was a great vindication of the belief Adam and I had in the act’s potential and of all the hard work we’d put in. This was a big step up. We had US representation and we were going global! The whole family was thrilled with the news.
True to their word, the agency almost immediately came through with a booking. We were to spend three months on a ship whose home port was San Diego. It cruised up to Alaska and called in at Victoria on the south-eastern tip of Canada. Every fortnight it returned home to drop off one set of passengers and pick up the next. We only had to do four shows a week: two on Monday nights and two on Wednesday nights. We were free to enjoy the sights and get off when the ship made stops. The cruise line provided our accommodation, all our meals and paid the freight on the equipment that needed to be sent over, and they paid $US1800 a week. (They paid per act, so it would be up to Adam and me as to how we split it — that meant it would be 50–50, no question.)
We had three months until September when we would set sail (how great did that sound!) and I knew we’d need every minute of it. There was a whole lot of new acts to come up with. New illusions required new apparatus but the time-frame was too short to commission anything from the Las Vegas builders so instead I went back to the Australian builder who had previously been very noncommittal when I approached him. I guess I now passed his credibility test because this time he took the commission.
We also had to acquire special gear for transporting the equipment. Until now we’d carted smaller apparatus in wooden boxes that Dad and I had made and everything else was simply stacked in the van in between packing blankets. That wouldn’t cut it for international freight; it was time to go pro. We needed what are known as road cases — those extremely sturdy black boxes with steel reinforcement you see on the loading dock of a theatre or concert hall. Ours were made to measure by Roadbox Industries, who we chose based on a good feeling about the boss, George. (When you come across someone who really gets what you’re about, in business or in the rest of life, make a point of keeping up those connections. By doing so you organically create a network of people with the right attitude and skills, making connections you can call on at some future point. That’s what happened with George, whose son Jai became a roadie and technician for us some years later.)
I mapped out two 45-minute halves using material from the schools show and the various competition acts plus new routines. Originally we had wanted to take Bianca along as part of the act but the agency nixed that, saying they wanted it to be a one-man show. Well the only one-man shows in my business are comedy-magic acts; I explained that Adam was an intrinsic part of the act backstage and, if there was no other assistant, onstage too. He and I got to work rehearsing, improvising as best we could around the apparatus that was still being made and rearranging the blocking so he could take over the parts Bianca had been doing. The entire family pitched in, working around the clock as the weeks disappeared. Nonna sewed costumes and other pieces, Mum and Dad built new sections for the backdrop and backstage area, and John helped out wherever he could. It came right down to the wire on the freight-shipping deadline, with a nerve-racking wait for the new apparatus, but we made it, just.
During all this preparation, Adam and I were still going out doing school shows around Melbourne and elsewhere in Victoria. If we had a day with no performance booked we could spend it taking care of all the things that still needed to be done. Otherwise we worked on it long into the night, tracking down information, emailing suppliers and rehearsing, rehearsing, rehearsing.
One of the problems I was trying to solve was how to keep the animals in the act, given the quarantine restrictions. The US had a fairly brief quarantine period, so in theory I could have sent the doves and Snuggles the rabbit over and made do rehearsing without them until they were released. However, they would not be allowed back into Australia at the end of the cruise because of our much tighter regulations. I couldn’t do that to my animals, so I was going to have to acquire some in America for the duration of the act then find a good home for them before
we left. I spent many hours searching through websites. Doves were plentiful as long as you wanted to release them at a wedding or funeral; ones you could keep and train were harder to come by. Eventually I made the necessary arrangements, buying American doves which would (rather bizarrely) be sent by mail for me to collect from a pet store in San Diego, where we’d be joining the ship. I had been able to train my own animals at home in a very relaxed, no-pressure way; I could only cross my fingers and hope that the ones I’d be buying sight unseen had easy temperaments and were quick learners!
Adam and I flew out in a state of high excitement. We’d allowed ourselves three days on American soil to pick up the animals, get them checked and accredited by a vet and start getting them used to being handled by me. The four doves and one rabbit were waiting as arranged and took reasonably easily to what I needed them to do. Going down to the San Diego Cruise Ship Terminal was a thrilling experience. I was twenty-one years old and, never having set foot on a ship before, I was about to go aboard this one as its youngest ever headliner.
We’d known from the beginning this particular ship was aimed at mature travellers rather than families or partying singles, but arriving and seeing the passengers going aboard we couldn’t miss the fact that most, if not all, of them were retirees. There were an awful lot of walking sticks and Zimmer frames. Sure, I had the routine where I appeared in top hat and tails but I was a very long way from a traditional dinner-suited magician. Still, the agency had seen the showreel so they knew my onstage look was spiky hair, cargo pants and a baseball cap and they knew the kind of upbeat dance numbers I used as my soundtrack. They could have chosen any magician, but they’d chosen me. They knew what they were doing.
Only a couple of the entertainers would remain on the ship for the whole three-month contract: myself and a singer from Vegas called Bobby Black. The others, including stand-up comics, a ventriloquist and various musical acts, switched every couple of weeks. As a headline act Adam and I had assumed we would get separate cabins but when we went aboard and registered we found we were sharing. Oh well, we were used to that.
There were a couple of other slightly unexpected things, although we didn’t think too much of them at the time. The cruise director sat us down not long after we arrived and laid out the rules that everyone who worked on the ship had to follow. There were various dining rooms and cafés on the ship but employees were only allowed to eat at the buffet and they had to adhere to a strict dress code. You were expected to be tidily dressed at all times, which was fair enough, but you also had to adhere to specific clothing for the buffet dining room depending what day it was: on Fridays you had to wear (neat) jeans and Saturdays you had to wear a suit. Having run through all this, the cruise director then said to us very sternly, ‘Okay, you’re two young guys and you’re on a cruise ship. Things get crazy here but I don’t want you guys getting caught with your pants down in dorms with passengers.’ That kind of behaviour just wasn’t our style anyway, but I didn’t have to look at Adam to know he was thinking the same thing as me: This guy knows the passengers are all 65-plus, right?
Meeting the captain also proved a bit odd. There was a lot of gossip flying around the ship about his supposed philandering. It was none of my business and if I thought about it at all, I figured the stories were most likely exaggerated. That was until the conversation I had with him in the bar where he jutted his uniformed arm out aggressively and said, ‘You see these stripes? Do you know what they mean?’ I thought they showed his captain’s rank, but in the crudest of terms he explained they were his indicators of sexual conquests. Charmed, I’m sure. I couldn’t really figure out why he was telling me, especially in that belligerent tone. It was as if, bizarrely, he perceived me as some kind of threat and was marking out his ground.
Well, so what if the captain was a bit of a Neanderthal? I really didn’t have to have more than passing contact with him. All I had to do was put on a great show four times a week and I knew I could do that. The auditorium where we’d be performing looked fantastic: it was a two-tiered professional theatre that sat eight hundred people. If it filled up, it would be the largest crowd I’d ever played to. I was nervous and excited, full of adrenaline. I couldn’t wait to get started; our first performance couldn’t come quickly enough for me — this was my ticket to the big time!
Wilson Du
MY INSPIRATIONS
ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER
Like Houdini, Arnold Schwarzenegger was an unknown immigrant to America who took every chance he could, made the most of every opportunity and broke through into the big time. That part of their stories very directly inspires me, since my aim has long been to break into America. I constantly think to myself: If they did it, I can do it.
Right from the start Schwarzenegger had huge ambition and the drive to realise it. I had seen him in movies when I was younger; he seemed to me like the toy He-Man come to life. Then at around age twenty I got seriously into fitness as I started to explore water escapes. I didn’t have any intention of being a bodybuilder but, like I always do, I researched the subject. I bought Schwarzenegger’s book The New Encyclopedia of Modern Bodybuilding, which teaches techniques and also tells his story; I watched videos of him; and I saw the 1976 movie Pumping Iron about the lead-up to the Mr Olympia competition which he was trying to win.
Pumping Iron had a particularly big impact on me. I found out much later that a lot of what seemed like documentary behind-the-scenes footage was really staged, but Schwarzenegger talking about his master plan was totally real. He wasn’t always the nicest person onscreen but he was easily the most compelling. He said boldly that he was going to be the best bodybuilder in the world, he was going to become a movie star, he was going to marry a high-profile, glamorous woman and he was going to go into politics — all of which came true, of course.
He had this incredible belief in himself despite all the opposition he met: the people who made him call himself Arnold Strong early on because they said no-one would be able to pronounce his name and those who dubbed his voice because they said no-one would be able to understand his accent, and all the other doubters. Every single thing that the so-called experts said was a liability he turned into an asset.
People think he is only physique and catchphrases, but that’s not what’s important about him to me. The reason he’s on my Inspirations list is that he had this huge ambition that he wasn’t afraid to lay claim to, despite what anyone said, and through sheer force of will he achieved everything he said he would. His story says to me anything is possible.
Adam and I were in high spirits, ready to make the most of our opportunity and LOOKING FORWARD TO VISITS FROM ADAM’S GIRLFRIEND AND FROM JOHN AND JILDA, WHO HAD BOOKED FOR VARIOUS LEGS OF THE CRUISE. WE HAD TWO DAYS AT SEA BEFORE THE FIRST SHOW; TIME TO FAMILIARISE OURSELVES WITH THE SHIP AND ITS MATURE PASSENGERS. IT WAS CERTAINLY GOING TO BE VERY DIFFERENT TO PERFORMING FOR ROWDY SCHOOL KIDS, BUT WHEN I GOT THE JOB THE AGENCY SAID I’D BEEN CHOSEN AS A NOD TO A MORE CONTEMPORARY STYLE OF ENTERTAINMENT. I WASN’T WORRIED ABOUT BEING ABLE TO WIN OVER THIS AUDIENCE; BY WATCHING AND LISTENING CAREFULLY I’D SOON SEE WHAT WAS WORKING AND WHAT WASN’T, AND I COULD TWEAK THE SHOW ACCORDINGLY.
The couple of days before our first show also gave Adam and me time to figure out our pre- and post-show routines. On Mondays and Wednesdays the theatre was ours but it was used for other shows throughout the week so we couldn’t leave our gear in place, we had to set up each performance day and pack up afterwards. That was a big job, with all the gear in the road cases having to be moved between the stage and the storage area, a large disused cool room up at the back of the auditorium. It was a long and laborious process, in and out of lifts and through one corridor after another. There were technical crews and roadies on the ship for the Superstar Broadway show, a Vegas-style review with showgirls in feathers and sequins and a male chorus in top hats and tails. However, the cruise management was unwilling to pay them to assist us, so it fell to Adam and me to take
care of our staging. A show as long as the one we were doing required a lot of equipment. Moving it around took hours and was exhausting, especially the pack-down after we’d already performed two 45-minute shows. A couple of weeks in, the tech guys, who we’d made friends with, agreed to help us out in exchange for beers (Pure Blonde only, none of the usual watery American stuff). The ship’s lighting tech also hung out with us after hours and generously shared his expert knowledge. It was an enormous learning experience for us.
The act really had something for everyone. There was audience participation, including the routine where I borrowed a ring and made it disappear, and the floating table illusion; there were card tricks, a hanky that danced at will around the stage, my new doves and rabbit, the top hat and tails homage to the past and quick change to the present, the straitjacket escape, and a couple of very effective larger illusions with Adam: sawing in half and ‘Twister’. The 1980s-inspired latter began with Adam pretending to graffiti a large box, then climbing inside it. Apparently trapped, his head would twist around at an impossible angle and when I opened the box his body was apparently similarly curled, like a corkscrew.
While I still did much of the act masked, thanks to all those school shows I was quite comfortable talking to the audience. By the third week in we were really firing. Plenty of passengers were coming along and the response in the theatre was good. But the feedback we were getting through the cruise director was more muted. All the passengers had appraisal forms in their cabin so they could comment on the shows they were seeing, the meals they were being served and various other aspects of their holiday. The completed forms were seen by the captain and then compiled into feedback reports for each act, given in weekly meetings with the cruise director. My reports showed that while some of the appraisals were excellent others were middling and some guests felt I was too edgy. I was eager to please so I looked for ways to adjust the show more to the audience’s taste.