Friday, September 05, 2003 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

SHOW REVIEW: Magic show transports audience to simpler times

Mac King's low-price act at Harrah's means plenty of repeat business

Mac King performs afternoon magic shows at Harrah's Las Vegas.

The only problem with having the best show bargain on the Strip is that other people are bound to find out about it.

Comic magician Mac King does his peak business during the summer. The afternoon berth and family-friendly comedy help reverse what's often a slow period for other shows.

So it's only with school back in session -- King returns from a post-Labor Day vacation of his own on Tuesday -- that you can get in hassle-free and often with discounts that make the show even cheaper than the reasonable $18.65 face value.

(An outdoor box office at the hotel's Carnaval Court dispenses coupons as needed to fill the room for $6.95 per person; those who pay full price get priority seating.)

You can tell from the comments of people around you that King's one-man show gets a lot of repeat visitors, which could be surprising because it doesn't change that much.

But a second or third viewing gives you a chance to appreciate how carefully it's constructed, how many laughs there are per minute, and how many of those laughs tie back to things said earlier.

In form alone -- the two have nothing else in common -- King and the Amazing Johnathan both reflect years of building a type of street theater into a long-form act where, through the years, they've weeded out every dead spot, added joke upon joke and made every word count.

Many of the jokes also have a second layer. For a first-time visitor, the main impression is King's comic rube character with the floppy bowl haircut, antique plaid suit and archaic slang such as "Howdy" and "Holy moly."

The repeat customer might think more about how craftily this approach puts the show in a more innocent time and place, and distances King from the ranks of Strip illusionists who think their bad hair, satiny shirts and Enigma music are still hip.

The plaid suit itself is one of many running jokes. You know he's a magician and that magicians hide things in their clothes. So King produces nearly every prop he needs from somewhere in the suit, and even retires an ashtray full of burning paper as casually as someone would put away their wallet.

"It's a smoking jacket," he says. "Pretty soon it's gonna be a blazer."

The goober persona also allows him to say stuff such as that.

A silent-movie comedian's knack for mugging also enlivens his interaction with audience volunteers. In one bit, he's using a yellow rain slicker as a "cloak of invisibility" to transport playing cards from one newlywed's pocket to another.

In another, he uses an echo chamber to "channel" the number of another volunteer's playing card after seemingly fumbling the deck. Again, a repeat visitor might notice that with many a magician, it's about guiding the audience with a strong hand of authority, a la David Copperfield.

With King, it's the apparent lack of control that allows the magic to sneak up on you. It's pretty funny to watch King show a youngster how to use a carrot slice to fake-swallow a goldfish. But then he spits a real live goldfish into a glass.

It might take a second viewing -- or perhaps a look at King's book, "Tricks With Your Head" -- to ponder the running theme of arrested adolescence that makes King a favorite of other magicians, who are basically all arrested adolescents.

The grand finale is the show's one illusion, when King transforms himself into a stuffed white tiger. The real punch line is that he's not lying one bit when he says it's the same trick you can see across the street by paying another $80 per person for Siegfried & Roy.

But it also puts into perspective the fact that the rest of the show doesn't try to overstep the cozy confines of the room. There's nothing to suggest that it's a small show trying to be a big one, or that seeing it in the afternoon is a lesser experience than seeing anyone else at night.

Las Vegas entertainment is so imitative, you'd think that King's three years of success would inspire more small-but-focused alternatives to the Strip's big-budget spectacle. But so far, not really.

I guess there aren't enough bad plaid suits to go around.