This was our first trip to FirstOntario Concert Hall.
It is a lovely theatre with 2 levels of balconies and a seating capacity of
just over 2000.
There is a 6 level parking garage across from the theatre (be prepared to
pay event pricing!) and quite a few surface lots within easy walking
distance.
The theatre staff were super helpful, professional, and generally
fabulous!
The show is about approximately 2 hours in length, including a 15 minute
intermission.
As always with this show we are genuinely afraid of posting spoilers.
The less you know going in, the more you'll enjoy it!
FirstOntario Concert Hall, Hamilton ON
On with the show...
Note to parents of young children: The music can be very loud
at times throughout the show. There are also smoke and fog machines
involved. Forewarned is forearmed.
There's a videographer on hand
to capture close-up miracles and project them on a big screen so everyone
can see!
It is always a treat to see Champions of Magic!
Pre-show vibes
There were plenty of children in the audience. Many people in the
audience had seen the show at least once before. Some of the
children brought their own RL/GL props! (IYKYK.)
They've added spectacular lightwalls upstage which add to the ambience of
the set.
The show is very different from the ones we've seen previously*. There
are significant changes in both the cast, and the structure of the
production. *Toronto
2018,
Oshawa
2019, Kitchener 2022, and Toronto 2023
For those who have enjoyed the shows they've presented in the past, not to
worry! They have retained some of their cornerstone
crowd-pleasers!
Some of the new segments are bound be become future cornerstone
crowd-pleasers!
Significant parts of the show consist of imaginative narrative brought to
life through full ensemble numbers.
There are also plenty of moments for each of the acts to shine as solo
performers.
There was LOTS audience participation with both children and adults!
By our count, 13 volunteers were involved. Many of the volunteers were
able to do so from the comfort of their seats. A lucky few were
brought on stage for a fully immersive show experience!
Some notes on volunteer handling. (Regular readers will recall that
we pay close attention to the
treatment
of
audience volunteers.) We were particularly impressed when:
- Velasco went searching for a child to bring on stage. The first
kid he asked, declined. Velasco didn't miss a beat and quickly found
someone else. Additionally, Velasco informed the selected volunteer
in advance what was going to happen, and then asked for her consent to
continue.
We think more kids were interested in helping out after that.
They got the sense that they weren't going to be pressured into doing
something they didn't want to do.
- At one point Young and Strange also required two children to
volunteer. These kids were also treated with respect and weren't
talked down to in any way. In fact, Strange broke character for a
brief moment and instantly put the boys at ease. It was as if he
manifested the same child wrangling superpowers gifted to elementary
school teachers, and parents of young children. This
segment of the the show
ends with the volunteers receiving tremendous audience applause!
Well
done team!
The show was visually stunning!
Whether you're new to magic or are a professional magician, there's
something for everyone!
Larsen showcased talents we'd not previously seen in a Champions of Magic
show. She has a very creative style that delivers personal and
refreshing takes on some classics of magic. As an added bonus for
magicians, she spent a little bit of time talking about her magical
family. This provided a springboard for captivating and organic
storytelling, punctuated with magical effects.
Velasco succeeded in breathtaking, heart-stopping stunts both large and
small. In addition to having the audience on the edge if their seats,
he also performed some head-scratching miracles at a smaller scale. It
will surprise you not, that one of this escape artist's effects conjures the
name Harry Houdini.
Young and Strange are always delightful! Even when (and in some cases especially when) they
are bickering, they are very compelling. One can't help but get caught
up in the fun they are having! Both individually, and together as a
double act, they consistently deliver impressive sleight of hand, laugh out
loud comedy, and a truly exhilarating exhibition of grand illusion.
Since we last saw them in 2023 they've introduced some pieces of magic that
were both very impressive and thoroughly entertaining. They get bonus
points for mentioning Canadian born magician Dai Vernon. Additionally
we were treated to video clips featuring Siegfried & Roy, and
David Copperfield. (It goes without saying that Young's
homage to David Copperfield Easter egg is still in the show.)
The magic is excellent. Most importantly, the show is wonderfully entertaining.
The acts and the scripts are a work in progress and continue to be
thoughtfully curated, updated, and revised. (Bonus points for
inserting both current affairs and localized content!)
This was our fifth time seeing Champions of Magic and we enjoyed it every
bit as much as the previous incarnations.
We highly recommend it! (Even if you've seen it before.)
Final bows with Sam Strange, Liberty Larsen, Fernando Velasco, and Richard
Young
Post-show vibes
Disclosure: We were guests at this show. The opinions expressed above
are entirely our own. We did not receive compensation for the writing or the
publishing of this article.
With thanks to Champions of Magic for the tickets.
My first memory of magic is on my fifth birthday, at the Magic Castle, on
stage with the one and only – Ireland’s Largest Leprechaun, Mister Billy
McComb. I believe he did the vanishing birdcage that day. He eventually got
me on stage as a volunteer and I was in heaven. I thought he was the bees
knees. And as I got older, he just got funnier and funnier. One of my
favorites ever. Rest in peace, Billy.
Other than your family, who were the first professional magicians you
remember seeing?
I was lucky enough to see the Siegfried and Roy show as a young kid,
and that show was truly mesmerizing, larger than life. It felt like being
in another world. I remember the electricity in the room. It was thrilling
and kinetic, and they were so graceful. They seemed to have walked onto
the stage from the clouds.
By what mechanisms did you begin learning magic?
I learned magic at Magic Camp as a kid (that’s right, folks!) in Idyllwild,
California. I also learned from dear family friends, and from books.
Liberty Larsen
Who inspires you that is not a magician?
Outside of
magic, I’m inspired by Joanna Newsom, Joni Mitchell and Leonard Cohen (two
very special Canadians who almost dated!), Jesca Hoop, Martha Graham,
Charlie Kaufman, Michel Gondry, Peter Brook, Carmen Amaya, Kate Bush,
Harry Nilsson, Tom Waits, Remedios Varo, Robert Moss, on and on… I love
people who make worlds out of their dreams and stubbornly insist on living
inside them.
In addition to performing magic, we understand that you are also a
musician. Have you studied anything else magic-adjacent? How have these
studies informed your magic performance?
Though I can’t say I’ve officially studied art, film or photography, I’ve
definitely been influenced by my own rogue education in all of those realms.
Everything that inspires, everything that lights up the circuitry,
everything that gives goosebumps, can translate into magic, I think.
I
draw from music more than anything else, because I look to magic to create
strong feelings. I’m not really drawn to cerebral stuff, or puzzles, it’s
not how my mind is wired. I can appreciate them but they don’t motivate me
to get on stage.
On stage, I don’t want to be clever. I want to
feel connected to people When I’m in an audience, I want to feel like the
performer is cracking my heart open like a walnut, and melting me. So, I
look to music for how to do that, because that’s how I’m wired. So I often
sing, because it’s a quick cheat to shift things from intellect into
feeling. But even when I’m not singing, the same elements of music – rhythm
and pacing, tone and resonance, harmonics and dissonance, dynamics and flow
– all these things go into good theater, and satisfying magic.
What, if anything, makes you nervous about joining the Champions
family?
Giant theaters! Exciting, but not something I’m used to. I’ve
performed in a lot of very small, cabaret style venues. This is a whole
different ball of wax.
What are you most looking forward to about joining the Champions of
Magic family?
The adventure of it! I love the electrical current that’s running
through this project. It’s got a strong pulse. It seems like I’m hopping
on a train that’s changing platforms and going to a whole new dimension.
This is such a fantastic group of people, and it’s an ambitious risk we’re
all taking together, which is a truly exciting challenge.
If you could go back in time to study (magic or otherwise) under
anybody, who would you choose to be your mentor?
I think I would go back in time and study dance with Martha Graham. I devoured
her autobiography and am so inspired by the way she lived her life. She was a
genuinely magical person, and a profound teacher. I feel like what she taught
could translate beyond dance into just about anything. She taught people how
to be deeply in their bodies, truly themselves and radically open to their own
source of inspiration.
Liberty Larsen
If you could prevent other performers performing an effect forever, what
would it be?
I read a truly terrible “gag” in an antique magic book about having
your Thanksgiving turkey get up and walk off the table. It involved using a
real chicken, plucked, and doing some terrible things to force it to be
still, and painting it brown as if it was roasted. I would outlaw that
turkey trick, punishable by tarring and feathering.
If you could only perform one effect for the rest of your life, what
would it be?
I am not sure I could ever be up to that challenge. But if I could
shapeshift into a bird while singing, and land one someone’s shoulder,
maybe deliver a secret message that only they would understand and that
would inspire a huge gasp, it would be that.
What’s your go-to Karaoke song?
“Get it While You Can” by Janis Joplin. Not because of the lyrics,
necessarily, but because her emotional range is just so great to sing.
What is the first thing that comes to mind when you think about
performing in Canada?
From the October 31st Instagram post by Young Hollywood, Liberty Larsen, and Fernando Velasco (one of her Champions of Magic co-stars) are interviewed about the Magic Castle:
Is there anything else you’d like to share with our readers?
I just learned that, “The first reference to throwing rotten
vegetables at bad stage acts came in an 1883 New York Times article after
John Ritchie was hit with a barrage of tomatoes and rotten eggs by an
unpleasant audience in New York. A large tomato thrown from the gallery
struck him square between the eyes and he fell t the floor just as several
bad eggs dropped upon his head.” The more you know…!
Thank you Liberty, for making the time to answer our questions!
The cat's out of the bag. 