AGT Winner!!! A MAGICIAN Mea Culpa

Discuss the latest news and rumors in the magic world.
fredreisz
Posts: 65
Joined: January 17th, 2008, 12:00 pm
Favorite Magician: Dai Vernon
Location: Bluffton, SC, USA
Contact:

AGT Winner!!! A MAGICIAN Mea Culpa

Postby fredreisz » September 17th, 2014, 10:27 pm

OK. I am making a confession. If you search my past posts you will see that I was not that positive about the magicians this year. The mentalism duo were great showbiz, I thought. People were competent but not the top talent in our field, as far I could perceive.

MAT FRANCO won so a great big congratulations to him. So many other top illusionists in our field have tried. I realize the 90 second format is difficult. Mat was very creative and certainly built the impact of his framing of magical experiences. Judges loved him. Good for him.

It seems to me that people primarily were taking fairly standard close-up magic and framing it on a new way for the show. I give them props for that. The level of magical skills, sleights, etc. was not very advanced...but do the judges (actual and the audience) care? Apparently, not, although they praise highly trained skills in other acts. (I know we hide ours.)

For myself, I will admit, the level of practice, difficulty, professionalism and training exhibited by many of the other acts, I though far out paced the magicians. (and I LOVE magic.)

I really mean congratulations to MAT. He pulled off his most amazing feat tonight. His career is on the rise. Watch out Vegas! Hope he continues to get good consultants and a great life in magic. I will learn from him.

I honestly am interested in other reactions. I am trying to learn how people perceive they are entertained by our "art." Peace....Fred (Reisz)
"The art of magic is the magic of art."

Steve Hook
Posts: 835
Joined: October 21st, 2008, 11:50 am
Location: Raleigh, North Carolina, USA

Re: AGT Winner!!! A MAGICIAN Mea Culpa

Postby Steve Hook » September 18th, 2014, 1:00 am

My heart weeps for magic...

User avatar
Richard Kaufman
Posts: 27054
Joined: July 18th, 2001, 12:00 pm
Favorite Magician: Theodore DeLand
Location: Washington DC
Contact:

Re: AGT Winner!!! A MAGICIAN Mea Culpa

Postby Richard Kaufman » September 18th, 2014, 11:33 am

Don't weep. A magician won ... doing material geared solely toward the lay judges. Who would have thought that any magician could ever win?
Subscribe today to Genii Magazine

Rick Ruhl
Posts: 686
Joined: January 17th, 2008, 12:00 pm
Location: Rialto, Ca

Re: AGT Winner!!! A MAGICIAN Mea Culpa

Postby Rick Ruhl » September 18th, 2014, 3:28 pm

I never did, ever.. and I'm happy he did. It means more gigs for all of us.

Magic is back on the rise again.

billmccloskey
Posts: 169
Joined: June 10th, 2011, 2:11 pm

Re: AGT Winner!!! A MAGICIAN Mea Culpa

Postby billmccloskey » September 18th, 2014, 5:35 pm

My god, how wonderful. A pretty much straight ahead out of this world, with some larger visuals for the theater audience, a pretty clever, but traditional cups and balls, and an ambitious card routine, no better or worse than many others. All well performed. And it won a million dollars and launched a career: with simple tricks most people here already do.

How fantastic is that! How great that an audience can love the effects that we all loved the first time we saw them (before we became jaded and bored), enough to beat incredible competition.

You guys should be thrilled.

GlennWest
Posts: 59
Joined: April 11th, 2014, 6:05 pm
Favorite Magician: Tyler Wilson

Re: AGT Winner!!! A MAGICIAN Mea Culpa

Postby GlennWest » September 19th, 2014, 12:54 pm

This is great. Among other good qualities, he has a huge amount of poise.

I haven't seen this mentioned, but in the Ambitious Card sequence when he's working for Heidi, he accidentally loses the selected, signed card. The sequence starts at around 2:15. He ends up with the Ace of Spades in his mouth instead of the selected card. Heidi is terribly confused, and there is no reaction from the audience. When he sees his mistake he doesn't even blink, he just moves on to the finale, after he relocates the selected card.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GbgFeG3ck8g

Very impressive work under immense pressure.

User avatar
Dustin Stinett
Posts: 7257
Joined: July 22nd, 2001, 12:00 pm
Favorite Magician: Sometimes
Location: Southern California
Contact:

Re: AGT Winner!!! A MAGICIAN Mea Culpa

Postby Dustin Stinett » September 19th, 2014, 4:58 pm

When we were watching it, I said "That was a mistake" and my wife said, "What was a mistake?"


Return to “Buzz”