Chris Bliss Diss

[Ian Kendall]

And here's my all time favourite juggler

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LA5cd9tXGMs

[mrgoat]

Menes is great. Mad chops, and graceful and effortless.

[CraigMitchell]

Michael Menes does a section which is identical to Rudy Coby with the 4 legs ...

Anyone know who the originator is or if this is done with Rudy's permission ?

[Timothy Hyde]

Michael Menes does a section which is identical to Rudy Coby with the 4 legs ...

Anyone know who the originator is or if this is done with Rudy's permission ?

I would guess it's an old music hall "bit", though I have no evidence of that.

Made popular in the 60's by Rolf Harris

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jake_the_Peg

[Max Maven]

Although I'm quite certain it dates back much farther, I believe the earliest version in the magic world is the three-legged routine done by Bob Swadling back in the 1960s.

To my knowledge, Rudy Coby was the first to start with four legs.

[Mr. Stickley]

Interesting, Max.

I do remember as a kid in the early 1980's going to both a B&BRB circus, as well as several Icecapade shows and seeing multiple actors (even on ice skates) with multiple legs. In fact, I distinctly remember one or more in police uniforms with the longer old school police jacket (Bobby? style) with the multiple legs underneath. Someone in a production/costume department circa '82-'86 made it a pretty standard bit in those types of shows I believe. I remember it pretty vividly as it was hilarious and quite amazing to me at the time.

Mr. Stickley

[mrgoat]

Oh and here's my brother's new juggling video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvHC5NklwYM

[Ian Kendall]

Now _that_ was stunning.

I hope non jugglers will appreciate the skill level being displayed.

[Rudy Coby]

This is Rudy Coby.

For the record, Michael Menes 'suddenly' did this after watching my show from the wings when we did a show at Ron Macmillan's International Magic Convention.

A month after we worked together a video of him doing my Four Legs appeared on his website.

Somebody told me about it so I confronted him - I have the emails that maybe I'll share one day when I write about this stuff in an upcoming book I'm working on.

It's ridiculous as you can imagine - the people that suddenly do my Four Legs always come up with referring to someone in Vaudeville, or Rolf Harris, etc.

First of all, it's NOT okay to steal from Rolf Harris - so that would seem a lame excuse - but anybody that knows ANYTHING about Variety knows that the Four Legs comes from my act. For the record, I've never seen this version which was a novelty song in the '60s (?) and the reason I won't watch it is so that I WON'T be influenced by it.

Also, I came up with the Four Legs because I had a dream of that character and then woke up and created it onstage the next day - working on it for years before I showed it to anyone. That was over 25 years ago in if anyone cares.

I think other people should 'wake up' and realize that when they do things like this, astute fellow performers and professional agents, etc, have to wonder what else in your act was created this way - the people that MATTER already know who created what in our very small industry.

I'm already bored with talking about this, but just wanted to state for the record that with this particular individual his 'miraculous' timing for putting this into his repertoire is one month after sharing the stage with me.

[Rudy Coby]

ps - I didn't see Max Maven's post before I answered this.

As far as I'm concerned, if Max Maven or Johnny Thompson states something as fact then the argument is over. They're the only people on Earth that I trust 100% on matters like this.

[mrgoat]

Now _that_ was stunning.

I hope non jugglers will appreciate the skill level being displayed.

Thanks. I will let him know.

The annoying thing is, years ago we both got Juggling for the complete klutz as a stocking filler. I actually sussed 3 balls before him and ended up teaching him.

Now he does this.

Bitch.

[Ian Kendall]

I learned from that book as well!

But I can't do blind back catches. Or pretty much anything else he does... :(

[Bill Mullins]

Chriss Bliss is still making news.