Magic up close and very personal
★★★☆☆
Bringing a standalone magic show to the West End is no mean feat, particularly for a significant run. Few have done it, particularly in recent years, but Jamie Allan is the latest to do so. Using this achievement as a chance to reflect on his route and inspiration into magic Amaze is vividly nostalgic and moving experience for him on stage as he seeks to, well, amaze audiences. At times he does this, his close-up work outstanding but where the show has grown to match the venue the cracks begin to show.
Allan shares his memories of discovering magic throughout the show, much of which was triggered by a Fisher Price magic set he received in 1982. He tells how his parents supported him, feigning disbelief as he attempted new tricks and encouraging in all the right ways to give him the confidence to grow, especially as a child in the 80s when magic was hardly the coolest thing to do. There is obvious gratitude and love in Allan’s retelling but this does tip over into sombreness and melancholy too many times for what in theory is a light-hearted magic show. This too attacks the pace of the production, the gaps between illusions fairly lengthy and the show bordering lethargic. There is a tender moment in which Allan performs a trick accompanied by his late mother’s voice, recalling how they never got to perform together (his mum being a musician) but this transforms into a rather baffling moment in which he then clumsily levitates an actor dressed as his mum ten feet into the air - a rather strange way to close the first half.
The bread and butter of this show and Allan’s skillset is his sleight of hand work. Often armed with an ordinary-looking deck of cards he can produce absolute electricity, a notable moment being his incredible ability to group suits of cards together through what appears to be random shuffling, revealing the cards in the order described by Sting’s song, Shape of My Heart. Outstanding. Equally, he works with audience members to add elements of randomness to the proceedings and manages to dazzle with his close-up magic.
During the opening of the show, Allan states that there are two types of audience members. The dreamers - here to experience the closest thing to real magic and the sceptics - here to work out how the trick is done. I very much fall into the latter category and for the most part failed in guessing how illusions are crafted but some of Allan’s stunts, particularly the large-scale ones felt flimsy and cheap. Most of these resorted to blasting light into the audience so we couldn’t see the stage - I hoped for more.
Whilst Jamie Allan does seriously impress with this close-up craft he underwhelms in scaling up this production. His nostalgic narrative is a little solemn but does attempt to recognise the importance of inspiring the next generation in whatever they wish to pursue. This one is for the dreamers, sceptics might want to sit this one out.
Currently booking until 23rd November - Tickets
Photography - Danny Kaan
