Martinsville Bulletin, Inc.
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Sixteen-year-old Mary Collins of Bassett lays on “The Spikes of Doom” table as illusionist Kevin Spencer pulled the lever to raise the 18 24-inch spikes. Afterward, she arose from the table unscathed — though the newspaper laid over her was pierced with holes.
(Bulletin photo)
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Monday, February 9, 2009
Many of the more than 900 members of the audience at Sunday’s “Spencers: Theatre of Illusions” squirmed in their seats, hands raised, as they vied to become on-stage volunteers for the pair’s magic show.
Whether or not they were chosen as magicians’ assistants, all of the audience members seemed to gasp and applaud at the tricks and illusions Kevin Spencer and his wife, Cindy, performed.
The magic show, part of Piedmont Arts Association’s On Stage series, was held in the auditorium at Martinsville High School.
Kevin Spencer captivated the audience from the beginning when he divided in half a narrow vertical box in which his wife was standing.
The bottom half of the box stayed put while Spencer slid the top half of the box away and onto a table set up beside it.
Even as the box sat in two pieces, Cindy’s toes wriggled from one half as she smiled and waved from the other.
Her husband slid the pieces of the box back together and, to the cheers of the audience, Cindy stepped out — whole.
He said to introduce her, “She’s my wife, for those of you who may have thought she was my half-sister.
“The humor in the show tonight is going to be really bad,” he warned the audience. “If you hear something that you think is supposed to be funny, just roll with it.” Despite the warning, audience members broke out into laughter, and they laughed their way through the entire show — when they weren’t sitting at the edges of their seats, mouths agape.
The magician said that this was a show of illusions, and to begin, he would demonstrate the difference in illusion and reality. He opened a copy of Sunday’s Martinsville Bulletin, reading segments off each page. “You don’t get any more real than the Martinsville Bulletin,” he said.
With a flourish, he tore the paper in half, then again, and again, until it was in shreds. “This is a figment of your imagination,” he said, holding up the pieces. With a flick of the wrist, he shook out the newspaper — which opened back up into the full paper it was before.
Spencer’s first assistant from the audience was 16-year-old Mary Catherine Collins, a sophomore at Bassett High School.
“This is going to be dangerous,” he warned her, having her sign a “standard release form.” When he handed Collins the clipboard, the many pages of the document opened, spilling to the floor.
The magician had Collins feel eighteen 24-inch, solid steel spikes that moved up through a table with the turn of a lever. Collins followed the Spencers’ cues with aplomb, laying down confidently on the spike-outfitted table called “The Spikes of Doom.”
He laid a newspaper on top of her, then topped her with a metal cover.
Kevin Spencer pulled the lever, and the audience saw the spikes move up from the base, and spikes poke from the top of the metal cover. When he released the contraption and Collins stepped out, she was unscathed, but the newspaper was filled with holes.
After the show, Collins commented that she was “just a little bit nervous, but I had a lot of instructions, and I trusted them.”
Among the many other tricks Spencer performed were two from Harry Houdini: walking through a cement-block wall and escaping a locked tank filled with water.
Robert Hatchett, 34, of Martinsville, supervised the walk through the wall, which was made of 224 pounds of concrete. Hatchett stood guard at the wall while Spencer appeared on the other side. After the show, Hatchett said that he wondered how Spencer did it: “He didn’t go around me.”
Jedidiah Pottle, 14, checked the equipment before the water-tank escape. He is the son of Kim and Tom Pottle of Bassett. After the show, Jedidiah said that the tank was indeed full of water, and the padlocks used to chain Spencer’s hand and lock the lid “were real.”
“I have no clue how he did it (escaped),” Jedidiah said, eyes wide with a look of astonishment. “I would really like to know.”
James Hammonds, 12, son of Jon and Rachel Lagergren of Lawsonville, N.C., participated in a mind-reading trick. Kevin Spencer guessed that James chose a Jack of Spades from the deck, then James held that very card up to show the audience.
Later, James said, “I really don’t know how he figured it. It was really weird ... I think he read my facial expressions.”
After the show, Kevin Spencer credited much of the show’s success to the volunteers who joined him on stage.
“Good volunteers on stage — that always makes the show a whole lot more fun for me,” he said.
The crowd was “really fun,” he said. The people in the audience fed “off each other” with enthusiasm, “and they did it from the very first trick.”
While children enjoy the show, “we don’t dumb it down for the kids,” he said. The show is targeted toward adults, who try to figure out the tricks, he added. |
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