How professional mAGICIANS have been impacted by COVID

Here’s a summary of an extract of a BBC RADIO 4 programme. Listen to the full programme here or scroll down and listen to the part of the programme about magicians. I have also created a transcript.

GLOSSARRY

1. Pandemic

   A disease that spreads over a whole country or the whole world

2. To be hit hard

   To affect someone or something in a profoundly negative way

3. Restrictions

   A rule, action or situation that limits what people can do

4. Bread and butter

   Main way of earning money

5. Cruise ships

   A big comfortable ship that people go on holiday on and stop at places during the journey.

6. Gigs

   Public performances

7. To fund

   To provide the money for something

8. To have something lined up

   When a series of events is planned to happen

9. To fall off a cliff

   To suddenly stop

10. To downsize

    To move to a smaller house

11. To spin

    To make thread by twisting something, in this case gold (spun is the past participle)

12. Outlook

    Way of seeing things

13. A silver lining

    If someone says that ‘every cloud has a silver lining’ it means that they see a positive side in sad or difficult situations

14. Hilariously

    Very funny

15. To plug

    To talk about a book, film etc in a positive way so that people see/read/buy it.

16. To cajole someone into doing something

    To persuade someone

17. Close-up

    To be very close

18. Drop

    To fall

19. In disbelief

    To be very surprised

20. Bewildered

    To be very surprised

21. A prop

    Something that a performer uses

22. To and fro

    backwards and forwards

23. To be like no other

    To be different

24. Out of the question

    Impossible

25. To turn up

    To appear

26. Incredible

    Amazing

Speaker 1 (00:00):

Now we've spent the past few months here on front row discussing how the COVID 19 restrictions have led to hardship right across the live performing arts sector, from singers to musicians, actors, dancers, stage crew, music venues and festivals but there is one group we haven't spoken about yet. I'm not going to tell you who I'm talking about, but if you concentrate hard, I'm going to send you a message telepathically. Are you getting it? No. Oh, well maybe that's because I'm not actually a magician or a mentalist but on the line I do have a couple of real practitioners of magic who've been hit hard and are both currently unable to perform, The Great Baldini and Romani Romani who was the first woman and the first Britain to win The World Magic Awards in Las Vegas. Welcome to you both. Let me start with The Great Baldini.

New Speaker (00:44):

What sort of engagements were you doing before COVID and were you able to make a living out of magic until then?

Speaker 2 (00:50):

Yes, I mean, most magicians at my level, and I was two years into my pro career, make a living - bread and butter from things like weddings, corporate parties, things like that, where you actually go and do close-up magic for wedding guests and corporate guests. And that's great. And you use that to try and, uh, fund and, uh, co-subsidise your stage show because I have my stage show ready to go to Edinburgh and Brighton fringe and everything. So the summer was going to be a big summer and then it turned off like a light

Speaker 1 (01:23):

And Romany was magic a full-time job for you as well?

Speaker 3 (01:25):

Absolutely for the last 20 years. So I was many working on cruise ships half a year, and then on big corporate parties and then big variety shows and rich peoples' parties really.

Speaker 1 (01:37):

And I mean, you know, obviously close-up magic requires intimacy. What happened when COVID hit? Did, did business just fall off a cliff Romani?

Speaker 3 (01:44):

Well, I do stage shows, not really close up anymore. So I had a whole year of work lined up and I was in Fiji. I'd just come back from doing a show out there. And within three days, my entire year of contracts was canceled. So what I did, I lived in Brighton with a little theatre in my house and I realised that I couldn't afford to do that. So I downsized to a tiny, teeny tiny cottage in the Lakes, opposite the a field of sheep and after a couple of months of shock and eating Hulu Hoops for dinner, um, I realized I wouldn't be any shows, big shows until probably next year. So I decided to retrain myself as, um, our dear Rishi has instructed us. And I realized that I always like to look for a silver lining. And I realized that I had published a book last year and hadn't time to promote it. And I realized I was now going to do the biggest magic trick of my life. And so I challenged myself that within a year, I'm going to manifest a million readers of this book called Spun Into Gold: The Secret Life of a Female Magician and why, because it's a book to cheer everyone up and to help us find the silver lining in a really tricky situation.

Speaker 1 (02:52):

We certainly need that.

New Speaker (02:53):

Baldini is there no way you can adapt your magic to include social distancing?

Speaker 2 (02:57):

It's incredibly difficult because your hand constant.....the best magic, Kirsty, happens in people's hands, where they're literally close up and their face just drops as they can't understand .... they're bewildered by what you've just shown them. And that constantly means that props are passing back and forward between you and the audience or members of the audience. And, you know, even at its most basic people don't want to take a card from you these days without wearing, you know, pro plastic gloves. Um, and you know, trying to get people on stage with two meters distancing. Some of the stages I perform on aren't even as big as two meters, frankly. Um, so it's very, very hard because magic involves the audience almost in a way that no other art form does or performing art form does.

Speaker 1 (03:45):

Now you have bravely volunteered to try some magic down the line with me and the listeners. Uh, we can't see each other, sadly. Um, but I've got my pack of cards, everyone at home, get your pack of cards ready? Okay, let's go.

Speaker 2 (03:58):

Excellent. If you pick up your pack of cards and shuffle them, as you normally would. Give them a quick, good mix-up.

New Speaker (04:03):

Ok shuffling shuffling - not very good at shuffling.

New Speaker (04:05):

Once you've done that, deal nine, the top nine cards face down onto the table in front of you.

Speaker 1 (04:12):

Three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. Okay.

Speaker 2 (04:18):

Make sure you've got nine cards and here we go. If you follow my directions, we'll see some true magic. Pick up the nine cards and fan them out so you can see the faces Kirsty. You can see every single face of the card.

Speaker 1 (04:31):

Okay? Yep. Alright.

Speaker 2 (04:34):

We're going to memorise one of these cards. Let's make it random. So there are three of us in the interview, Romany, Kirsty and me. So let's remember the third card from the left in your fan. So if everyone could remember the third card from the left in your fan and burn it into your mind. You must remember it or the tricks pointless.

Speaker 1 (04:51):

Okay. I've got a terrible memory. Yep, yep, no, I got it. Seared onto my memory.

Speaker 2 (04:57):

Close up the cards, hold them face down in your left hand. So you can see the backs but not the fronts they checked already. And now, now to further burn that card into your memory, we're going to spell it out, dealing one card face down onto the table for each letter of the cards value. We'll start with the value. So if you have an ACE, it would be A C E and you deal a card on each letter. Do you get that?

Speaker 1 (05:25):

Yep. Okay. Yeah. So you spell out the number. Okay. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (05:27):

The one face down car for each letter. Go ahead and do that with your own cards.

Speaker 1 (05:31):

Okay. I've done that.

Speaker 2 (05:34):

Excellent. Now take what the cards you've got remaining in your hand, drop them on top of the cards on the table.

New Speaker (05:41):

Yep.

New Speaker (05:42):

And pick up the whole deck of cards again.

Speaker 1 (05:45):

Okay.

Speaker 2 (05:46):

Wonderful. Now every card has a middle name. It's OF, so the Jack OF we're going to spell out OF.

Speaker 1 (05:54):

OF Okay.

Speaker 2 (05:55):

And then again, drop the cards on top of the cards you've dealt onto the table.

New Speaker (05:59):

Yep.

New Speaker (06:00):

Excellent. Take the rest of the remaining cards in your hand again. And lastly, it's the suit. It's clubs, hearts, spades or diamonds, whatever it is. You spell that out. So if I'm doing clubs, it's C L U B S. Whatever it is.

New Speaker (06:14):

OK done that

New Speaker (06:17):

Excellent. Outstanding. If you have any cards left in your hand, just drop them on top of the pile.

New Speaker (06:23):

Okay. They're dropped.

New Speaker (06:24):

So we did this all differently. We all had different packs of cards. We all shuffle those cards. The queen is spelled differently from the Ace and Spades is different from Diamonds. So we all mixed up those nine cards differently. But one thing we have in common is we're all listening to you on the radio. So let's use the magic of radio, pick up the cards and spell out radio - one card for each letter with me, R A D I O. The last card is an O - you should always end magic in an O, that O feels good to me. Turn it over. Is that your card?

Speaker 1 (06:56):

Oh my God! Yes it is! Incredible! Yes! I've done it! 3 of spades I'm so relieved!I was rather nervous about this. I was almost sure that I wouldn't get it right.

Speaker 2 (07:06):

Fantastic! And let's hope everyone at home got their card.

Speaker 1 (07:08):

That is great! Um, Romani presumably some magicians are able to pivot online or can't you do magic on zoom?

Speaker 3 (07:18):

Well, the thing is, in my career, I've always followed my heart. Like I've never really gone for the money. I've followed my heart. And, and at the moment, I just, I'm not interested in zoom. I I'm just so excited about doing this big magic trick, because I think that if I can do this.... manifest a million with Spun into Gold, then I can tell the story afterwards of how I did it, but saying that because I'm a magician and not a miracle worker and magician was takes advantage of the moment Kirsty. And I know that you've got 2 million listeners and I want to do a trick, super quick. And I wanted to ask you live, if you would agree to read or listen to the audio version of Spun into Gold and if you liked it, invite me back to tell everyone about it because then I could manifest a million readers and do magic

Speaker 1 (08:01):

Excellent bit of plugging. Now that's a bit of magic plugging but I want to get back to Baldini. What are you doing now, I say, so we know what Romanis doing but what have you been doing since you can't do magic?

Speaker 2 (08:14):

I had 60 live performances of my show canceled over the summer, just like that. I then had 14 weddings canceled two corporate gigs. I came back from holiday ready to do the Brighton festival and nothing. So I went....the only people hiring were Dominos. So I went down there and signed on as a Domino's delivery driver. And I now deliver pizzas between four and eight every night. And the only real benefit for that is I get to listen to Front Row every night.

Speaker 1 (08:39):

That's fantastic. I mean, but is the Magic Circle doing anything to help you all?

Speaker 2 (08:47):

They're a very good club. They have a survival pack on their website. They're really pushing mental wellbeing and some advice on financial help and that sort of thing. But it's, they also do a lot of online stuff and they try and keep the community happy and going. And there's a great monthly magazine. It's a great organization. And it's a real, uh, I want to say fraternity, but with Romany here, it's a family. Uh, so it's, it's everyone, everyone is in the same boat. I don't know a magician who's performing at the moment. I really don't except on television.

Speaker 3 (09:16):

I mean, there are, there are magicians performing on Zoom. So Sylvia Sceptre's performing on zoom and several of them are, um, and I've got this little magic cottage and I could, and maybe I will. Um, but right now, as I say, I I'm, I'm doing a different magic trick but Kirsty you didn't say yes or not. I want you to....

Speaker 1 (09:32):

Yes, yes, yes, yes.

New Speaker (09:34):

Now I'm happy.

New Speaker (09:38):

She's got me there.

New Speaker (09:38):

You can tell she's at the top of her profession!

New Speaker (09:42):

Absolutely. The Great Baldini and Romani Romani. Thank you very much and all the best. I hope we see you back at work as soon as possible because we all need a bit of magic in our lives.