Philip Escoffey: Six Impossible Things Before Dinner
Note: This review is from 2008
Review by Steve Bennett
All I demand from my mind-readers is that they astound me and Phillip Escoffey certainly does that. Slick, confident and with a practised ease at handling audience responses, he rejects the portentousness of so many practitioners of his art.Escoffey welcomes sceptics and believers alike to his show, exploring whether he can make members of both camps switch sides. He is sniffily cynical about many of the less-effective charlatans in his showbusiness field, and the hapless Mystic Meg’s predictions provide the basis for two of his better set-pieces.
Nobody likes to imagine they’re readable, apparently, but working on the notion that if you toss a brick in the air, you’ll hit someone with something to hide, Escoffey lobs a foam block over his head to select his volunteers, always offering the option not to participate. Using cards, keys and pennies he predicts the seemingly impossible, and makes his targets appear to do so too.
Only once during the show I witnessed did he make a legitimate mistake, one punter proving a better liar than Escoffey gave him credit for. His final trick, set up at the beginning of the show is simply staggering, leaving believers and sceptics alike shaking their heads as they depart the venue for their promised dinner.
Reviewed by Jay Richardson
Review date: 1 Jan 2008
Reviewed by: Steve Bennett
