Welcome Guest [Log In] [Register]
We hope you enjoy your visit.


You're currently viewing our forum as a guest. This means you are limited to certain areas of the board and there are some features you can't use. If you join our community, you'll be able to access member-only sections, and use many member-only features such as customizing your profile, sending personal messages, and voting in polls. Registration is simple, fast, and completely free.


Join our community!


If you're already a member please log in to your account to access all of our features:

Username:   Password:
Add Reply
Mindfreak Magician Reveals New Show Secrets
Topic Started: May 23 2008, 10:00 PM (54 Views)
darrenromeofan36
MINDFREAK MAGICIAN REVEALS NEW SHOW SECRETS INCLUDING HIS
Modern-day Houdini genius magician Criss Angel has promised we’ll see “amazing things you could never have imagined” when his new $100 million-plus Cirque du Soleil show, Believe, is unveiled in previews at the Luxor on Sept. 1.

For now though he’s let slip some secrets about his new 4th season of A&E top-rated cable-TV Mindfreak shows. “We’ll be live from Florida when we do the first show of the new season on July 23,” he told me. “It will be something really crazy, really extraordinary, really unbelievable and really dangerous; something we have never attempted before. Then the second week we will attempt to walk on water here at Lake Mead! That won’t be a miracle as was written in the Bible, my version is strictly magic. This will be the first time a magician of the art has walked on water. It has no religious overtones.”

Ironically, as Season 4 starts airing Criss will have to start pre-production of Season 5 filming for the 2009 episodes and juggling his schedule to include the new Cirque show and a full-blown Hollywood magic movie.





He explained: “I don’t sleep a lot. It makes life easier to have more hours in the day. I am very committed to my art and the different projects and I am going to do my best to have a life, yet do all these things I am excited about doing. “

I asked Criss to clear up the controversy that the animal protection organization PETA started over a news leak that said he was going to work with live rabbits in the new Cirque show. “I assure you there are no live rabbits in the show,” he laughed. “No rabbits are being used at all. I’ve seen and heard all the rabbit reports but it’s totally untrue. The closest we come to is that we have a large stuffed rabbit dressed in an antique gown as an “homage” to all the rabbits that have been used as the universal symbol of magic acts. In my show though the rabbit costumed characters pull me out of the hat. This show is all about emotion being put back into magic rather than animals and pretty women swapping places inside boxes or cages. ”



Criss, now dating beauty Giselle Diaz, had just wrapped a grueling day- long satellite media tour that began at 3 a.m. to promote the new Mindfreak series. He says that the Cirque show that he’s co-written with Cirque’s director Serge Denoncourt is in homage to his hero, the late Harry Houdini.







Criss explained that the legendary magician and escape artist, who he’s modeled his own career after, used a code word to his wife on his death bed believe,” Said Criss: “Our new show will blow your mind, invigorate the way you think about magic and reawaken the child that lives in us all. Nothing like this show has ever been created or even attempted before. It is an incredible collaboration and it brings magic into a new realm.” Luxe Life has previously reported that one special effect will be a hurricane that emanates from his mouth and as he blows it the entire audience will be engulfed by it throughout the theater. Criss has said that the entire show is a tribute to Houdini and he’s treating the entire theater with its audience as an integral part of the show, so everything is in the open and not hidden.

Denoncourt explained further: “We feel as playful and excited as children in a gigantic toy store. It will be a haunting exploration deep inside Criss’ inventive mind. That’s scary because its completely different to what you see on Mindfreak. He hovers between the land of the living and a surreal world uniquely woven together by his and our distinctive imaginatrions. Unlike traditional magic-themed shows Believe transcends any preconceived notion of what it means to be emotionally engaged by the arts of mysticism and illusions. There are no girls in the box every five minutes. It’s a fantasy, a highly theatrical tableau of mood, reverie and emotion set against a backdrop of dreamlike darkness and light.”

Criss who conceived the original idea for the story, will star as a surreal, enigmatic Victorian Noble and as he travels the path of imaginative exploration he encounters Kayala and Crimson, two women who represent different aspects of femininity and four bizarre Ushers who introduce the audience to the baroque theater of his mind. A high-energy troupe of characters and dancers will mix a multitude of styles into the visual feast punctuated by moments of grace and sensuality. The stunning illusions, some of which Criss has imagined achieving now for 15 years, come to life not as stand-alone elements but interdependent components using heightened imagery, fantastic creatures and impossible feats of legerdemain. The new theater at Luxor has been custom-built for the show.

The gala premiere is scheduled for Sept. 12 and Criss will perform under terms of his incredible 4,000 show 10-year contract twice nightly at 7 p.m. and 10 p.m. Friday through Tuesday and take off Wednesday and Thursday. Tickets with a top price of $150 went on sale this week for the regular performances. Wade Robson is the choreographer for the show, Meredith Caron is the costume designer, Eric Serra is the composer and musical director, the puppets designer is Michael Curry and John Farrell is the director of illusions.

Criss summed up: “You will definitely see things that are beyond anything artistically I have ever attempted before. Its daring and a lot more dangerous and challenging, in fact, I will go on record and so will Cirque- that this show is the most difficult and technically challenging show to pull off, way beyond even KÀ. On my first trip down the Strip when I got here 12 years ago I’d see all the Siegfried & Roy billboards. I had a crazy dream that maybe one day it could be me. Now it is all coming true.”
Member Avatar
Administrator
In everyone of us there is an illusive melody, which when heard and followed leads you to the fulfillment of your fondest dreams."
Quote Post Goto Top Offline Profile
1 user reading this topic (1 Guest and 0 Anonymous)
« Previous Topic · Place to talk about Magicians · Next Topic »
Add Reply