ADULTS ONLY MAGIC SHOW: Circus Review

WHAT: Adults Only Magic Show
WHEN: 13 - 23 April 2023
WHERE: Arts Centre Melbourne (The Famous Spiegeltent)
CREATED BY: Sam Hume and Justin Williams
PERFORMED BY: Sam Hume, Magnus Danger Magnus, and Justin Williams

Sam Hume and Justin Williams - Photo Supplied

Roll up! Roll up! Grab and drink and prepare for the funniest naughty night in town at the 2023 Melbourne Comedy Festival. Adults Only Magic Show is one of three offerings by Showmen Productions this year. This is the one you DON'T bring your kids to.

Adults Only Magic Show is possibly one of the most fun shows in Melbourne right now. It is packed full of wonderful legerdemain and prestidigitation and, more importantly, this is a show full of humour (and a couple of dangly bits).

Hume and Williams have been performing amazing magic together for ten years. In the beginning they did the whole Houdini shebang. Their shows were full of props and costumes and all the water tanks and coffins you would historically have associated with magicians. Then the house burnt down.

Picking each other up from the soot and ashes, the pair shook off the embers, lifted their chins and started all over again. The lessons they have learnt along the way are the very things which make Adults Only Magic Show so great.

There are still props and costumes but what these guys have worked out is the real magic of the show is the craziness that the audience brings. Adults Only Magic Show is full of slight of hand and misdirection as members of the audience are brought up on stage and hornswoggled before our very eyes. The fun comes because every trick involves an audience member and there is no controlling what is going to happen when you bring random people on stage and ask an audience to make the decisions.

DON'T PANIC! Hume and Williams are just a fun pair of guys who like a laugh WITH us not AT us. In fact, they seem to often find themselves laughing at how they have been confounded by the audience rather than the other way around. They are very much the butt of their own jokes.

Speaking of butts, we do get to see a lot of  Williams' tooshy. He has a fondness for a certain gold jock strap which we see a lot of. Whilst there is maximum exposure of all the performers, Williams and Hume are from the Gypsy Rose Lee school of titillation. Magnus Danger Magnus on the other hand... I will stop drooling now ;)

I admit, I can't speak too highly of the comedic talents of Magnus. He takes the role of MC and magician's assistant and brings the house down with laughter whether he is speaking or just walking across the stage. 

Adults Only Magic Show is a late show (9:45pm) and is the perfect ending to any night out. You will laugh from start to finish, expel a whole lot of oohs and aahs, and might even blush once or twice along the way.

4.5 Stars