by Dynamo
I would see street magicians of all ages do incredible things with everyday objects; they’d perform close-up card magic, make flowers disappear and do the most incredible things with balloons. They were so quick. And they would make a killing from willing punters eager to place a bet on where a card or flower might end up next.
Before then, I was probably conforming a little bit more to what I thought a typical magician might do, like cup and ball routines; I was working on an act that had to be done in a specific setting, thinking along more traditional, linear lines. Being in New Orleans changed everything I thought I knew about magic. I didn’t realise that you could just do any type of magic anywhere. I didn’t have the mindset then, that if you could really do magic, you just do it. You don’t need a fancy set with smoke and mirrors – all you need is yourself and the spectator. In later years I would disregard having anything like a cup and ball routine or any type of props as such. While I always travel with my cards, I prefer to improvise with what is around me. People’s watches, phones, a drink can, an old piece of wire, snow… it doesn’t matter what it is, I’ll always find some way to create something astonishing out of nothing. Whenever I do magic, whether it’s a booking, in front of my mates or even, sometimes, when filming my TV show, I love the art of the unexpected; I can even surprise myself sometimes.
OVER TIME, I realised the importance of knowing what your peers are doing. You can’t live in a world where only you and your magic exist; how can you learn and grow from that?
But while I may study other people’s concepts, I’ll always change them and make them my own. I’ll look at what someone’s done and take it to the next level: magicians may have walked on water before, but never on a body of water as dangerous as the Thames. I’ve admired and learnt from magicians including Houdini and David Blaine, and there are many magicians that I’ve been lucky enough to meet along the way who have added to my experiences, ideas and style.
Many people think magic started with Houdini, the infamous escapologist. Yet you can trace magic back to the dawn of time; it was probably called something else in those days. If you look at the drawings that cavemen used to do, there was certainly an element of mysticism in those paintings. Having a sense of wonderment, and questioning what is and isn’t possible, is, I think, an inherent part of human nature.
Recorded magic is as old as history itself. Around 5,000 years ago, a common man called Dedi was summoned to the palace of an Egyptian pharaoh called Cheops. Dedi was thought to be 110 years old and survived on 100 jars of beer, a shoulder of beef and 500 loaves of bread a day. After arriving at the palace, he was asked to perform the magic he was famous for – decapitation. He grabbed a goose, a pelican and an ox, and, in turn, pulled off each of their heads with his bare hands. Once the stunned crowd had ascertained each animal was dead, Dedi picked up the head, took it back to the now-lifeless body and stuck it back on. Each animal immediately squawked back to life, running around the palace, much to the delight of the pharaoh and his subjects.
You can imagine his thoughts when the king asked him to perform the magic again on a prisoner. I’m not sure how he wangled himself out of that one…!
Throughout time and through many civilisations, from ancient Greece and Rome to medieval England, magicians have been a crucial part of society. Back then when there was no television, cinema, computer games, Twitter or BlackBerry, people had to make their own entertainment. Whether that was William Shakespeare entertaining the masses at the Globe, or the likes of the court jester amusing the Queen and her subjects, people have always wanted to be amazed and entertained.
It was around the nineteenth century that magic really changed. Before then, it had been the domain of the very poor or the very rich, taking place either in palaces or sewage-filled market squares. The middle classes sneered at magic, believing it to be for the simple and poor or the rich and bored. But then a Frenchman called Jean Eugène Robert-Houdin swapped the wizard cloaks for a top hat and tails. Robert-Houdin took magic to the theatre, giving it a physical home and a broader audience. Robert-Houdin was known for some incredible magic – most famously catching a bullet between his teeth. Magic had earned a newfound respect, finally beginning to shake off the stereotypes of ‘witchcraft and wizardry’.
After Robert-Houdin came the almighty Harry Houdini, who would go on to become one of magic’s most famous practitioners. Still widely regarded as the greatest ever escapologist, stunt artist, showman and magician of all time, Houdini awed millions of people all over the world during the late 1800s and early 1900s. He escaped from a straitjacket while being dangled upside-down from a crane one hundred feet in the air. He freed himself from an airtight case at the bottom of a swimming pool. Manacled in a lead-encased crate, he was lowered into New York’s East River and escaped in just fifty-seven seconds. There was always a new challenge that Houdini was willing to try.
Houdini eventually died in 1926 after receiving a series of blows to the abdomen by a university student named J. Gordon Whitehead. Whitehead had asked Houdini if it was true that he could take any amount of punches to the stomach, to which Houdini, lying down on a couch at the time, had replied yes. Houdini stood up, but before he had time to prepare himself properly, it is said that Whitehead unexpectedly hit him three times in the stomach. Already ill with a ruptured appendix, he continued to perform but died a couple of weeks later on 31 October of peritonitis. He was fifty-two years old.
Through Houdini, and others like Robert-Houdin, David Copperfield and Siegfried & Roy, magic became a legitimate art form, as revered by society as music, painting or sportsmanship. There’s a reason why David Copperfield is one of the top ten highest-paid celebrities worldwide. This guy stood in the centre of a ‘tornado of fire’. He escaped from Alcatraz. He made NASA angry when he made the moon vanish for four seconds. You don’t get to play to the amount of people that Copperfield has and make the money he has made by being ‘quite good’. And he is not the only master of his trade. Penn and Teller might have a very different style to Copperfield, or indeed to me, but they are without question the best magic duo out there. They are constantly reinventing what magic is and I respect them greatly for that.
The entire history of magic is really a whole other story, but I wanted to give a little insight into how it all happened because, as I always say, if you don’t know where you’ve been, how do you know where you’re going?
In those early years, I had a lot of lessons to learn, and it’s because of meeting people like Daryl the Magician that I was able to hone my magic and start to see success. As well as observing Gramps, I soaked up ideas from the street performers in New Orleans and other professionals like Lee Asher, Mac King and Wayne Dobson. They may not be household names, but within the world of magic, they’re respected by the best.
That’s what I learnt during my time in America that year. I went with the idea that magic would be a lifetime hobby; I left with the knowledge and the knowhow to turn it into a career. I guess I should be thankful to those Golden Retrievers!
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CHAPTER 4
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AVOIDING THE STRAIGHT LINES
WHILE I WAS in Memphis, I made a decision. I was going to move to Las Vegas, the home of magic. I’d seen how the likes of Daryl the Magician had built their careers and I was inspired. I’d had such good feedback from doing the dog shows and the odd performance in Memphis that I felt confident I could make my name in Vegas. My vague, some might say insane, plan was that word of mouth would spread and my own television show would soon follow. Simple.
I returned home and formulated a plan. I would get myself a gaming licence so that I could work in Vegas when I turned twenty-one. I figured that I’d get a licence in Bradford, sort out a placement in Vegas and then pursue my career in magic, but have the licence to fall back on if anything went wrong.
I got myself a trainee position working as a croupier for Gala Bingo in Bradford. A croupier is someone who works in a casino
on everything from the blackjack table to the roulette wheel. I would take people’s bets as well as working out what they’d won.
I’d always been pretty good at maths, which is essential in the job, and I spent a lot of time adding and multiplying at scarily fast rates. I didn’t realise it at the time, but thinking fast on my feet would bode well in later years; particularly when it came to doing predictions. Being able to work out the odds of something quickly is not a bad skill to have in my line of work.
This being Bradford, it wasn’t all glitz and glamour; there was no Sharon Stone lounging half-naked over the Texas Hold’em table and James Bond swilling his specially shaken Martini. It was working-class people standing on gaudy carpet with bright overhead lights, lots of late nights, and because it was before the smoking ban, the club would be full of clouds of B&H as punters puffed away over the tables. I’d leave in the early hours of the morning, physically and mentally exhausted, stinking of smoke, sweat and the spilt drinks of customers who’d gotten carried away with the booze.
Despite all that, I enjoyed the work. I was always busy and it was well paid and I had a goal in mind. I was working towards something and as I saw my savings slowly increase, it gave me even more impetus to work long, unsociable hours. My boys may have been out partying, but I couldn’t let that be my life at that point; I needed to stay focused on my goals: a licence and Las Vegas.
I managed to save a couple of thousand pounds quite quickly and, a few months later, I had enough money to take a short holiday to the infamous Sin City. I landed at dusk, and because the airport is so close to the main strip I could see the sun setting over the ‘Eiffel Tower’, the ‘Pyramids’ and the ‘Statue of Liberty’. The lights of Vegas are so bright, you can see them from space. As I left the airport terminal to jump in a cab, the view of the city as it turned from dusk to evening was pretty magical.
It’s no surprise that magic does such big business in this city: it’s loud, brash and full of empty promises and broken dreams. When you’ve lost your life savings on the roulette wheel or the blackjack table, you’re going to want to see something that gives you hope. In some ways, Vegas is the home of magic. It’s where all the main players ‘retire’ to when they’re ready to do a few years of shows and make their millions on the constant stream of audiences that pour into the city each day.
I’ve met some of the most interesting magicians in Vegas, and it’s also a place where I have learnt the most about magic – not from watching it, necessarily, but from listening and talking to other magicians who are masters of their trade.
On that first trip, for example, I finally got to see Apollo Robbins, one of the world’s most famous pickpockets. He describes himself as a ‘gentleman thief’. He was the first person I met who really understood the power of communication.
He worked in Vegas as a host at Caesar’s Magical Empire; he was the guy who greeted everyone before they had dinner and took them through to the dining room. It was quite amazing to see; all these unsuspecting diners who suddenly found their watch, wallet and phone in the hands of the mischievous host. Obviously he returned everything at the end!
When the former US President Jimmy Carter went to Caesar’s for dinner, Robbins was told he was allowed to do anything, apart from touch the President; so he stole every single gun from the Secret Service, the President’s security detail. Not long after, he was asked to work as a security consultant for various law enforcement firms.
I didn’t meet him that time, but later in the year we were both at a conference in Vegas. I managed to sidle up to him and we started chatting. We immediately got on and he invited me to a nearby twenty-four-hour diner, where he really broke the art of magic down for me.
‘People follow straight lines, they don’t follow curves,’ he told me. I didn’t know what he meant at first, but he continued. ‘When I’m onstage, if I want to do something, but I don’t want people to see it, I use an arc with my hand because people are less likely to notice anything. Because there’s no straight line, there’s nothing for them to follow. If you’re doing anything as a straight line, and there’s an off moment, people will notice it.’ His analogy was much better – it made a lot more sense! But it was an invaluable lesson; using an arc and avoiding a straight line, literally and metaphorically, is key in magic.
We talked for ages after his show. He, I, and a few other magicians just sat in the diner until six in the morning, talking. It was the first conversation I’d had with people about magic where it wasn’t about the ‘tricks’. That’s when I really started to understand that it’s about the people you’re performing for, and the way you communicate with them. Those magicians in Vegas showed me about the power of showmanship and stage presence, the kind of things that you attribute to superstars like Michael Jackson. There are so many things that Michael did which are now synonymous with him – like the Moonwalk for example. He didn’t start off doing that, he wasn’t born knowing how to do it; it’s something he created and then practised and practised until he made it seem effortless.
It really made me think about my approach to magic. I realised that I don’t perform magic; what you see and how your mind perceives it is the magic. Magic only happens in the spectator’s mind. I’m presenting what I do in a certain way, but without the spectator there is no magic. Without them, it simply doesn’t exist.
Another thing that I learnt was that I don’t really believe in ‘magic’ as such, which I know sounds weird. I don’t believe magic exists as a ‘thing’ at all; to me it’s more a physical feeling and emotion that you get when you see something that you can’t explain. When you’re a baby, you have no idea how anything works, so everything’s magical.
The greatest magic I’ve ever experienced will always be at Gramps’ house. But some of the best lessons I’ve learnt have been on the streets of New Orleans, over breakfast in Memphis and in twenty-four-hour diners in Las Vegas.
I’D ALWAYS IMAGINED that some day I’d end up in Las Vegas with my own show. But after that first visit, I decided that actually, Las Vegas wasn’t the place for me. I didn’t want to be stuck out there for a long period of time and I didn’t really want to be on a stage performing. I wanted to be on the streets, amongst my audience.
But I still travelled to Vegas for the odd visit. The more I went and the more magicians I met there, the more it made me re-evaluate my approach and the direction I wanted to take with my magic. I wasn’t like any of those guys with their big stage shows and incredible props. I didn’t have a suit and tie and there were no lions involved in my act. But meeting people like Apollo and Daryl, I saw that I didn’t need to follow the herd. Being myself was actually the greatest strength I had. When I started out, there was certainly no one else like me. I was a young kid from the North of England who, like most teenagers, liked music, video games, films and girls. And that was a great thing. Kids my own age related to me, and people who were older than me were intrigued to see magic done, live, in the street in front of them rather than from via television where they might suspect trickery.
Being different was the best thing about me; in many ways it was one of my main strengths and it would help me a great deal in those early years.
Although I didn’t move to Vegas, the money I saved as a croupier helped me to start my own business. The city did help me begin a professional career, just not in the way that I had expected. With my savings, I would travel around Leeds, Manchester and Bradford, making links in the music and television industries. I started to turn up at hip-hop shows where artists like Ms. Dynamite and Jazzy Jeff would perform on tour. I started to put together pamphlets, quotes and clips that would eventually end up on my first DVD.
While Vegas might not have been right for me as a magician early on in my career, maybe one day I’ll end up there. I have lots of ideas for my live show, but I want to really think about it properly before I do it, so that it’s the best live magic show anyone has ever seen. That’s when I’ll know that I’ve re
ally made it. When I can sell out a few months at Caesar’s, I’ll finally pat myself on the back and say, ‘Yes, Dynamo. You did it.’
WHILE I’M NOT ready as yet to have a live show in Vegas, I have experimented with theatre in the past.
In 2007, I did a live show in London. At that point, I’d had some success, but I still didn’t have my own television show. So, as a sort of business card, I decided to create a live show at the Soho Theatre to which I could invite friends, family and members of the industry. It was very stripped back and low-key – it was about as far from Vegas as you can get.
After the short run of five nights, to my utter amazement, Kevin Spacey invited me to the Old Vic to perform it for him. He had seen me do my magic at a Prince’s Trust event a couple of years before and really liked it. I had various corporate companies interested in booking me as a live performer, so he offered to help me condense the one-hour show into a twenty-minute capsule that would work in the corporate world.
As the lights went up, I could see him in the audience and, if that wasn’t pressure enough, the actor Jeff Goldblum was sat right beside him. No pressure.
Trying to translate the close-up magic I do into live theatre turned out to be a lot tougher than I had anticipated. The whole show was based around me interacting with a television screen, and before I’d barely begun, the scart lead decided to break. Not the best start! After that, everything seemed to go wrong and I could see Kevin furiously scribbling notes throughout.
Afterwards, Kevin took me into his office and told me straight: ‘This doesn’t work’. Admittedly, it was tough to take such straightforward criticism, especially from an actor and director that I admired, but it was what I needed to hear. The show was terrible!