I was wrong... Princess Crusises

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Jonathan Pendragon
Posts: 394
Joined: July 13th, 2010, 7:33 am

I was wrong... Princess Crusises

Postby Jonathan Pendragon » November 18th, 2015, 9:10 pm

I have always been attracted by brains, perhaps I am a zombie. it would explain a lot; pale complexion, picky eater. The benefit of smart friends is that they are very handy when you have a questions. I talked to Jim Steinmeyer, and I was wrong about the show on Princess Cruises.

The performers are magicians with theatrical backgrounds. None of them are Illusionist, but they know magic and they know theater and they know "movement", illusions they can learn. What I spoke about was training and craft and how critical it is to great magic. Being an illusionist takes great craft that all too often is diminished by those who have never practiced it.

Jim spoke to me about the difficult work of putting the show together and trying to bring all craft to bear on evoking a magical world. which is extraordinarily difficult. I wrote about it in one of my columns, where does the magic come from, the magician, the prop, the air? for magic to work on stage, that has to be defined. Jim told me about the struggle to do just that. We can all sing "there is magic in the air" but is there? The audience has to feel it.

20 years ago I worked on a film directed by one of my hero's Norman Jewison. My job was to choreograph a levitation which opened the movie. I worked with two actors, one I knew from reputation. The magician was played by a French-Canadian actor and his assistant/wife was played by a German Diva. I had seen her perform Kurt Weill and new she was good. Together, there were problems, upstaging problems which bothered me because it took focus from the "power of the magician" I was trying to stage. It bothered the Canadian actor because he was the one being upstaged. I learned quickly that this had gone on long before i got there. We were shooting the grand bow when she moved and he screamed ... a lot. I turned to Norman who was sitting behind me and he just through up his hands. Like I said, they had been doing this a lot. I don't know what came over me, I turned to the stage and screamed, "Shut-up, look 20 years from now this film will not have subjective subtitles, it will NOT say under your spoken words, "look we had an argument on exactly how to do this scene," It will just be you and the words and the only conclusion they will be able to come up with is that you are lousy actors, so bury it and go back to your starting marks and try and look like a happy couple who just did a f------- amazing illusion!" At first I felt happy about getting it off my chest, but then I realized I had just overstepped my bounds with a legendary, oscar winning, director. I turned slowly and said, "I am so sorry, I way overstepped my authority." To which he replied, "Shhhh... I think it's working, "20 years from now", I am going to use that." And then he smiled and nodded his head.

Magic is theater in the right hands and I was a fool to question someone who knows magic and theater better than anyone I know, Jim Steinmeyer.

and West and I are going to see Beauty and the Beast at the Pantages, Friday.

Bill Mullins
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Re: I was wrong... Princess Crusises

Postby Bill Mullins » November 18th, 2015, 10:38 pm

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Jonathan Pendragon
Posts: 394
Joined: July 13th, 2010, 7:33 am

Re: I was wrong... Princess Crusises

Postby Jonathan Pendragon » November 19th, 2015, 2:48 am

Yep, that's the movie, Bogus. We shot the levitation in Toronto. We used a classic flying rig which didn't allow lateral rotation. I used some of the moves, including the backflip through the hoop, that I had come up with when I did a fan of wires levi for Disney. I added something here that I really liked. I had her fall out of the air into his arms which required a change in the rig and R and D, but it was worth it, it looks great.


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