ON SECOND THOUGHTS: MARC SALEM. To 5 August.

London

ON SECOND THOUGHTS: MARC SALEM

Tricycle Theatre To 5 August 2006
Tue-Sat 8pm Mat Sat 4pm Sun 3pm & 6pm
Runs approx 1hr 40min No interval

TICKETS: 020 7329 1000
www.tricycletheatre.co.uk
Review: Timothy Ramsden 21 July

The Mozart of mind-reading returns to the Triycle.
Calling Marc Salem’s show mind-reading is like saying the British climate’s been going through a warm spell lately. In his 100 minute show there’s only one place I could see a possible cheat (if all his audience helpers are stooges, he’d be paying out more than the rest pay for their tickets).

He puts himself at physical risk, having nicked a hand on opening night in working out from someone’s one-word answer which of 3 styrofoam cups has an upended knife under it, smashing his hand down on the 2 he thinks don’t. A mere ‘Yes’ or ‘No’ tells Salem when you’re lying, a skill used throughout his show. Tonight, he’s right.

There’s financial risk too, with £20,000 offered to anyone who can select which of 4 cases has the right combination to an electronic safe containing the money. Three contestants have first choice of cases, and Salem’s not gone home poorer yet. There again, they’re only guessing.

Or are they? This is the only routine that could easily be a cheat (if the safe were operated by some offstage beam, not the codes). The rest astonishes – memorising the order of a multi-shuffled card-pack in 12 seconds, then saying which of 2 people holds each card; having one person choose a page from a novel (supplied from the audience) and helping another spell out the first 2 words, sight unseen.

The culminating act, from his previous show Mind Games, is the piece de resistance. Severely blindfolded, Salem identifies objects from the audience, giving their history, while, in a kind of mental juggling, telling complete strangers what journey they’re thinking about, and who was with them on it.

If he’s cheating all along, the cheats are brilliant. Despite this chubbily clubbable American’s moments of mountebank-style patter, though, the odds are it’s all mental skill amazing enough to turn a Salem-atheist into a true believer. Were it not, the trickery would be brilliant in its own right.

If George Washington’s father was like Marc Salem, no wonder the USA’s founder couldn’t tell a lie. A good thing he’s not into world domination.

2006-08-02 03:09:01