"Stories on the road" from T.G.M.

Alton Towers

I was contacted by an advertising company, who I had worked for a few times in the past. They said they had a client who was “pitching” to supply all the gifts and toys etc in the gift shop at Alton Towers. The idea was that their representatives were going down to Alton Towers the day before the presentation and wanted me to join them, so that we could discuss how I could tailor my magic to suit some of the gifts that they were going to present to the management on the day. We agreed a fee for two days work and they said they would send a chauffeur to pick me up along with the managing director of the firm who lived in the Blackburn area. It made a nice change, rather than me driving to the venue, unfortunately it doesn’t happen too often.

We all stayed in a lovely hotel not far from Alton Towers and over dinner they explained what they would like me to do. I was there basically to liven up their presentation, as there were several companies “pitching” to get the contract for the gift shop and they wanted theirs to have a bit of “sparkle”. They showed me all the fancy toys that they were thinking of selling in the shop and said I had an hour and a half to come up with some different kind of presentation that would link my magic to their products. It was by now 9.30 pm and I was to do the show at 11 pm. I had taken with me nearly every close up trick that I could do and went to work trying to put together a show involving their products.

Fortunately I’ve done this kind of presentation a lot and used some past ideas that have worked well, giving the impression I had just thought them up, there’s nothing like a little white lie to get them to think you’re a miracle worker. So at 11 pm I came back into the bar to find they had told nearly all the hotel and staff what was happening and all of a sudden I was doing a close up show for 50 odd people. Anyway to cut a long story short everything worked well and with a bit of fine tuning over breakfast the next day we set off for Alton Towers feeling confident with the whole presentation. There were two of them who were going to do the talking about the toys and I would do a one minute trick on 6 occasions throughout the 30 minute presentation.

We arrived quite a bit earlier than we should and was told that they were behind with the time slots, so we had a couple of hours to pass. One of them said, why don’t we go on a couple of rides while we are here. I have been on lots of rides all over the place in the past and have come to the conclusion that I like to keep my feet on the ground. However I thought I should join in on this occasion and off we went. I’m not sure which rides we went on, because most of the time I had my eyes closed and hanging on for “grim death”. The children seemed not to have a care in the world, with both hands high in the air as they shouted to their parents below. Now I had  had a good English breakfast, but I’m not sure it tasted quite as good second time around. No I wasn’t sick, but you just get that feeling don’t you as you are whizzed at great speed up side down and back to front. The other two fellas I was with thought it was great fun and when asked if I had enjoyed it, I just nodded, probably looking like the Incredible Hulk, no I don’t mean physique wise, I was just green.

Well the presentation time came, which was in a very hot board room in front of a panel of five from Alton Towers. As my head was still spinning and I might just have tasted my breakfast for the third time, I decided that it was the last time I was going to go on any high speed roller coasters and up to the time of writing this, it has been.

Well the presentation went very well and all the tricks worked and I think I hid my nausea very well. Our team went to the bar for a debrief  session and they were very confident that they would get the contract. By now I was feeling much better and ready for my dinner. Two of the team decided to go back out on some of the rides and asked if I wanted to go. I said I would have loved to, lieing through my teeth, but the MD had to get back home and I was travelling with him. So we had a quick dinner and travelled back home in style in the limo.

Well they got the contract and I got paid the next week, which is unusual and they want to do a similar thing at another Theme Park in the near future. I know what you are thinking and you are right….. I have learnt my lesson, I will not be going on any more rides again, especially if I’m working.

The Russians are coming.. Hoorah, Hoorah !!!

When the agent phoned up about this “gig”, it seemed one of the easier ones, close -up magic for 50 people in Burnley, isn’t life full of surprises!!! I arrived at the venue in plenty of time, already changed, as it’s only 10 minutes from my house. I’ve worked here several times before and knew the duty manager quite well. In the car I’d already worked out a plan for the night and was envisaging 5 tables of 10, or possibly 7 tables of 7 (I know that’s only 49, but you know what I mean).....“Hello Martin, this is going to be different for you, isn’t it” said the Duty Manager on greeting me in reception. He had a silly little grin on his face as he spoke. “Why’s that then, John” I replied,

“You’d better come with me” he retorted. When I entered the large dining room, all the tables had been set in an oval shape, I apparently was to perform inside the ring of tables, there had been no gap left for me to get in or out. Not a problem, I thought, it just means the 8 tricks I was thinking of doing on each of the tables, has now been extended to about 25 tricks. The problem with this scenario, as all you table hoppers out there will know, is that because it’s like one big table, everybody tends to watch all the time, so you just have to have lots more material than normal. I’d taken my full magic case, but even so I’d have to dig deep.

“Can you speak German” asked John, I didn’t reply but I must have had a puzzled look on my face. “They haven’t told you have they” he queried. “TOLD ME WHAT” I retorted in exasperation. To cut a long conversation short, it turns out that all 50 people were German and couldn’t speak any English at all. They had come on a weeks cultural visit to the area, and had an old lady "Frau Schmidt” as an interpreteur. Help !! I thought, should I do a runner. No, the show must go on so I decided I was going to do my whole close up act, plus some I hadn’t done for a long time, but speaking through the interpreter, a very dour looking Frau Schmidt. Bear in mind I was booked from 7.30 until 10.30pm, this, I thought, was going to be one long night.

I entered the arena, through a small gap they had opened for me, I turned through 360 degrees and saw 50 expressionless faces looking at me. I felt like a Christian being fed to the lions in Roman times. “Good evening, everybody, welcome to Burnley” I smiled. Frau Schmidt translated very quickly, the whole 50 people stood up and said “Guten Abend” and sat back down again. Surprisingly enough, the next 3 hours was one of the most pleasurable experiences I can remember. I put in all the normal jokes I use, not knowing if they really understood or not, they laughed in all the right places, albeit 30 seconds later, after Frau Schmidt had done her bit. I performed with cards, coins, ropes, even resorting to the “Rubic cube trick”. What’s that in German?? I only had one heckler who shouted “Wo ist das Kaninchien” which means “where is the rabbit”. This obviously led very nicely into the “Snowy the mouse” routine.

Before I knew it, it was 10.30pm and I was taking a bow, feeling somewhat dizzy, I’ve never revolved as much, while doing magic in my whole life, but that’s what you get, when you perform in a circus ring. As I left the arena, they all stood up again and applauded and a chorus of “Gute nact” and “Fantastisch” rang around the room. Frau Schmidt came to me and thanked me for the night’s entertainment and gave me a bone-crushing hug, as only German Frau’s can do. All in all, it turned out to be a very pleasurable evening, no thanks to the agent though, who might have given me a few more details, although to be honest, I might not have taken the job, if I’d have known the true facts.

 Like someone once said about performing magic.........."It's a funny old game"