Prolific writer, Psychologist and magician Professor Richard Wiseman, who has attracted more than 800M views on YouTube and worked with the likes of David Copperfield, Penn & Teller and Darren Brown, comes across as a very unassuming and likeable chap who excels at interacting and entertaining the audience and also has some surprisingly good tricks up his sleeve. Combining erudite wit, a cardboard box full of self-made tricks and a deep knowledge of the subject matter is a compelling combination.
The upper studio of The Scottish Storytelling Centre is an intimate space, with an audience of perhaps twenty, ranged in a semicircle around Wiseman. He happily gathers us into his tight spotlit table.
Wiseman takes us on a brief tour of the life of some of the unseen and unknown inventors of magic tricks and illusions and shows some of the tricks which brought them fame.
Reenacting, The World’s Greatest Card Trick, an infamous card trick created by American Paul Curry in 1942, Wiseman involves the entire audience in randomly calling the entire deck of cards as black or red and sorting them into piles. Often billed as the trick that fooled Winston Churchill and made him late for a critical war meeting, the climax involves the unveiling of the two piles, one completely red the other totally black. Quite how he does it, given that some audience members literally changed their minds mid deal is not clear at all. In fact, it is very perplexing! It is a fine ending to a very enjoyable and edifying show.
Reviewer: Greg Holstead
Reviewed: 29th December 2023
North West End UK Rating: