The Billet Article - Librarian’s Ramblings

This article is taken from The Billet Issue - 448 - Jul 2009, Authored by Peter Wright

Librarian’s Ramblings

Well tonight is the night. Perhaps none of you have noticed but tonight the Librarian Entertains. I hope you enjoy what we have got lined up for you and that it will bring the magic contained in the many books that the Circle holds to life. We want to lift it off the page and show how it can be entertaining and fun.

Basically the idea will be that we will divide the members attending into about three or four groups. Each group will be given some library books containing tricks, jokes etc. and a couple of packs of playing cards, ropes, coins and dice. The object is to devise a short 6 - 10 minute act to entertain the rest of us. Now I know you semi professionals and experienced members could fill 6 minutes without even thinking about it but the trick will be that all of the magic and/or jokes will have had to come from the library books. At the end of the 6 minute entertainment I want the group to tell us the name of the tricks and which books they came from. Hopefully this way we can bring the printed word to life and you can see some of the magic performed by magicians who know what they are doing. (!!). Also if you see a trick you fancy including in your act then you will know which book to find it in. Anyway I am sure that it will be entertaining and in the end we shall have a vote to say which group gave the best show. I don’t think there will be any prizes I am afraid as I can’t think at the moment what to give a group of individuals but watch this space you never know.

If the above activities do not fill the evening then we have something rather special at show you. Recently the Circle obtained a special set of DVD’s from the Pendragons, the famous American husband and wife act. On these DVD’s they discuss and disclose many of their secrets for the first time. I will bring a video projector and we can show extracts from the DVD’s For those of you who don’t know who I am talking about, Jonathan and Charlotte Pendragon are an award-winning husband-and-wife team of illusionists who call their work "physical grand illusion". They are widely known thanks to numerous national and international television appearances. The couple are distinguished from many other husband-and-wife magic acts in that Charlotte Pendragon is credited as an equal partner rather than an assistant. She has been honoured in her own right as a magician and has achieved notable firsts as a woman in the magic profession.

The couple met at the University of California, where Jonathon was studying theatre and Charlotte was studying dance. They married soon after. Charlotte (born Charlotte Brown) is a dancer and former gymnast and body builder. Jonathan (born Jonathan Yarbrough) was a gymnast, spring board diver, martial arts expert and fencer. He used his athletic skills in a career as a Hollywood stuntman, performing the back hand springs for John Belushi down the church aisle in the film The Blues Brothers. He became Belushi's stunt double and friend, coordinating stunts and second directing in the movie Continental Divide.

Jonathan and Charlotte's athletic skills allowed the pair to develop a distinctive and graceful take on classic illusions such as levitation. Their show includes a number of illusions with which they have become particularly associated, including Interlude, in which a woman crawls through a man's chest. They were the first artists to perform this trick. They are revered by fellow magicians for their version of Metsmorphosis. This illusion won them a place in the 50th edition of The Guiness Book of Records, under the heading of the "Fastest Transformation Illusion". I am sure that we have all seen them perform this illusion on television if not you can see them perform it on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fb41Hafvoi4 on your computer. Another ground-breaking illusion is Clearly Impossible, a sawing the lady in half trick designed by Jonathan. Its distinctive feature is a transparent box that allows the audience to see Charlotte from head to toe throughout the trick.

I don’t know if they will reveal all the above-mentioned illusions as I haven’t seen the DVD’s yet but as you can imagine illusionists of this calibre do not often share their secrets so the disks should be very interesting indeed.

To find out even more about the Pendragons they have their own website at www.thependragons.net.

Well if you are reading this after the July meeting Jean and I really hope that you have enjoyed the evening.

That’s it for this month – see you next time.

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