This isn't on the illusion in general, but I thought it applied to this forum.

In a stage show what do you guys find to be more effective, if you perform a killer routine using a lot of comedy, the audience laughing the entire time and being amazed at the end? or Performing an illusion to beautiful instrumentals,looking more a piece of art than a magic trick. With the same reaction at the end, the audience being amazed?

Which do you perfer and why?

Kohl & Company vs David Copperfield, One I am amazed and the other I laugh so hard, tears come down my eyes. The comedy I remember the seriousness of Copperfield, I have to think hard to remember.

I love'em both, but a great comedy is worth it's weight in gold.

I would agree with Den, people tend to remember comedy!

I personally use comedy and rarely use anything serious. that's because I feel that comedy keeps everyone off center and not really knowing what to expect. I know that as magicians we should keep everyone on the edge of thier seats but there is something to be said when you can keep people on edge by laughing soo hard!

Robert Long

I would agree, to a degree with the others. I love to make people laugh and I use the fact of what I look like to do that. I come out all serious and then I start to make fun of myself and do a lot of comedy. But, I also have parts of the show that use some serious routines. I like to keep people on a roller coaster of emotions, from making them freaked out, to amazement, to unstoppable laughter. I like to touch on them all so they never know what is coming next.

I agree with the above. A comedy act with magic interlaced is far more entertaining to the majority of the audiences than the best serious entertainer that basically says "Look at me and what I can do". The only truely disappointing magic act I ever personally experienced had way too much dancing and non magical moments so I tend to avoid that pitfall in my shows.

Comedy and laughter helps people escape their worries and loosen up. Because of this fact, it tends to me more memorable in my opinion.

Maybe it's a stupid question but how can you perform a funny subtrunk routine or something like that?

Basic Comedy sub trunk: one person, in convict garb is put in trunk but police person (use ball and chain on leg, Keystone Kops type byplay), do the usual swap, but possibly change outfits as well.

Or do it in mocking seriousness, male and female swich places, but their costumes don't - gender humor.

My first mentor was my grandfather, Howard Brooks. He was entirely comedic. He used to say there's nothing as serious as creating comedy. I turned out to be a serious performer.

He saw me perform once and afterwards told me, "Oh well, it ain't funny - but at least its MAGIC." As he turned his back I heard him mutter, "...sort of."

IMO it's best to have a lot of comedy but also to take a few things in your act seriously in order to Jar the pace of your program and let people realize that you as a person also have things that you love and enjoy doing. Read Maximum Entertainment. This book will tell you a lot about the comedy to serious magic ratio. I believe a show is far more substatial and entertaining by combining both the comedic and serious artistic magic at different points in the show. Just be sure what you are doing fits who you are.

Shakespear said to use comedy to introduce drama and drama to introduce comedy.

The best comedy can always have that heart-felt moments and the best plays have their comical moments. Yes a good mix works well.

Good comedy is hard to do! Anybody for a vanishing watermelon, and I don't mean the sledge-a-matic method!
:)

You can do a show without being serious, but you can't do a show without being funny. Even Copperfield has his funny lines.

I'm a serious performer, but I spent some time in comedy clubs because I know that comedy is important no matter what type of show you do.

JoeJoe

I disagree that people don't remember non-comedy magic as well because I do my kicker ending big time illusion serious and rest of show is comedy. But it stands out because of the seriousness I think!

Awww Den, what is wrong with Smash-O-Matic?

Now here is an idea, you do a vanishing watermelon that starts out like the old vanishing radio (cloth over item, item lifted up with cloth, "throw item", yank empty cloth in air), but you somehow swich the real watermelon for a fake sponge melon, "throw" it right at the edge of the stage, so it looks like someone has a melon coming at them. Don't do to little old ladies or people with bladder control issues.

Dennis obviously has not seen my Bubba Whodini cut and restored watermelon routine.

In New York just this week during Lucy's three ring routine, I and others with the show thought that a man in the audience was going to join her and dance with her on stage. There was only the music and her linking ring routine but Lucy has been a very serious lifetime ballet dancer. She had him hooked on the "magic rings" within a minute of being on stage. She was very seriously doing absurd things with solid metal rings that linked and unlinked to the music.

It was highbrowed music and movement with intellectually ridiculous outcomes. Mouths were gapped open and heads tilted but no one was laughing. It was generically a very old magic trick most of the people in the room had seen many times before but not as a serious art form. It was the presentation and not the hardware. It set the expectation in the room for the rest of the show.

The rest of the show was essentially comedy. However, the audience recognized that serious magic was behind it. There is absolutely no reason not to make both work hard for you.

(BTW --- They expect us back for another week in two years!)

My favorite scene from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid is when they get trapped and outgunned in the mountain rocks and have to jump to the river below. One (Robert Redford) admits that he would rather stand his ground there and fight to a certain death than jump. He could not swim. The other (Paul Newman) laughed at him and said, "Swim? Hell the fall's going to kill you!" They jumped. And the movie was far from over.

Use them both (seriousness and comedy) for all you can get from them. Entertaining with magic is a theatrical feeling experience for the audience. Give them the ride of a lifetime. They are safe in their chairs and living through you. Go for it!

Bob
Magic By Sander