I still remember as a kid watching the magic specials of the 1970s. I would gawk as David Copperfield and Doug Henning achieved the seemingly impossible with considerable ease, never once thinking that it was skill they were demonstrating and not actual magic. I really believed that magic was possible.
That’s the attitude Mat Franco wants you to bring to his show on the Las Vegas Strip. For Franco, one of the best close-up, sleight-of-hand magicians in the world, the enjoyment of magic is not knowing how the trick is done, but the way it makes you feel.
And for countless fans who have caught Franco’s show, the feelings are those of genuine appreciation. Franco invites you into his world of wonder with enthusiasm, humor and just plain fun. He’s one of the most engaging performers around, instantly making his audiences feel like they’re part of the act—which, they soon discover, they are. Franco wastes no time in picking volunteers for his bits, from ramen noodle packets that contain much more than noodles to playing cards that flit from person to person.
Along the way, you get to know Franco’s backstory—you get to meet, through video clips, other family members, and see Franco’s meteoric rise to fame through America’s Got Talent, which he won in the show’s ninth season. You also hear how his grandmother was his biggest supporter, how she tried helping him achieve the illusion of cards appearing as if from nowhere. And then Franco shows you how it’s really done, producing so many cards from thin air it’s hard to process. It’s the absolute high point of the show, and likely to be its centerpiece for years to come.
Not that there isn’t plenty more where that came from. Several of Franco’s best bits are straight from AGT, so fans of those performances should have a good idea of what to expect. Two highlights: a smashed cell phone that later appears in the last place you would expect; and a wine bottle and a cardboard tube that continually have you doing double takes. Like great songs, it doesn’t matter how many times you see Franco perform these; they’re endlessly entertaining.
But the illusion Franco is proudest about is the one he closes the show with, one in which he recaps the events of the show with a deck of cards. This trick is the one that gives the show its name: Magic Reinvented Nightly. As Franco told me in an interview, “There’s something about the simplicity of it, the personal element of it. It’s based on an old trick called ‘Sam the Bellhop’ … I thought, ‘I’ve been doing this routine since I was a kid. Why don’t I customize it and make my own version?’ That one has a special place for me.”
Just like Mat Franco himself now has a special place in the hearts of all those who have seen him perform.
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