Latest news from Magicians.co.uk

Magicians.co.uk is proud to be an Approved Supplier of entertainment at The Magic Circle Headquarters and to support the venue team at promotional events.

To add a touch of magic to your next event at any venue, call us on 0845 00 62442.

Magicians.co.uk will be exhibiting at The National Wedding Show in October, the UK’s largest wedding showcase.  With hundreds of wedding experts and suppliers, the event at Earls Court London will give you some fantastic ideas for your big day.

So if you are planning your wedding come and visit us at The National Wedding Show (Stand D6) to enjoy some fantastic free entertainment and a taste of what we can do.

Magicians.co.uk provides Magic Circle magicians, mindreaders, silhouettists, caricaturists and other magical entertainment for weddings and parties all over the world. To find out more about our wedding magicians and entertainers visit our Wedding Magicians page.

Pick Pocket James Freedman was a guest of Jeremy Vine on BBC Radio 2 yesterday.

He was invited to talk about street pickpockets following yesterday’s news that playwright Alan Bennett had had his wallet, containing £1,500, stolen by pickpockets pretending to clean ice-cream from his coat.

During the interview, James answered questions from callers and gave advice about how to avoid falling victim to a street pickpocket. Then listeners heard Jeremy challenge James to steal something from him. After only a few moments of distracting talk, Jeremy discovered that ‘The Man of Steal’ had managed ‘borrow’ his credit card, iphone, car keys, a pen and his wallet!

If you missed it then you can listen to the interview on BBC iPlayer (available for 7 days.)

Playwright Alan Bennett was mugged this week by a gang of girls who secretly flicked ice-cream onto his jacket, then as they ‘helped’ him to clean it off, they quietly helped themselves to his wallet too.

But another similar distraction scam is currently doing the rounds in London and one of our team, professional mindreader Graham Jolley has been targeted. He writes – This scam caught me totally by surprise. Please don’t be naive enough to think it couldn’t happen to you or your friends and please pass this information to any men who may be regular supermarket customers.

Here’s how it works. Recently, I became a victim of a clever scam while shopping at Tesco.  Two very attractive girls in their early twenties, came over as I was packing shopping bags into my car. One of them had a bucket of soapy water and the other started to clean my windscreen with a sponge. They only wore skimpy t-shirts and I realise now that they were distracting me. When I offered them a couple of quid they declined but asked for a lift to the local McDonalds.

Stupidly I agreed and on the way, one of them took off her shirt claiming it was wet from the water. Then she started climbing onto my lap while the other one stole my wallet.

I’ve had my wallet stolen on May 4th, 9th & 12th – twice on the 15th and the 24th – three times last Monday and probably once again next weekend.

So please tell your friends to be vigilant. This is a horrible way to take advantage of us older men.

By the way, Tesco has wallets on sale at £2.99 each.

Graham Jolley

Conjuring at the Court is London’s longest running monthly magic show, where some of the UK’s best magicians amaze guests with remarkable stage performances and unbelievable sleight of hand.

On 24 June the show celebrates its anniversary, so prepare to laugh and be entertained as the performers read your thoughts and demonstrate the impossible. You will also get the chance to see the trickery close up as the magicians join you during the interval!

The special anniversary show will feature stage pickpocket James Freedman ‘The Man Of Steal’, alternative magician Sean Heydon, the award-winning Richard Pinner; classic conjurer Russell Levinson and the fast visual magic of Stephen Barry.

For more information about the event visit the Conjuring at the Court website or email tickets@conjuringatthecourt.com.

The Illusionist starring Edward Norton and Jessica Biel will premiere on UK TV this Wednesday night.

The film is about childhood sweethearts Eisenheim and Sophie, who are reunited after 15 years. But Sophie is engaged to volatile royal Crown Prince Leopold and he doesn’t take kindly to his fiancé’s feelings.
 
Magicians.co.uk were magic consultants on the film, creating a range of amazing effects and teaching the actors special techniques. The film was directed by Neil Burger, who commented on the work of our magic consultant James Freedman; “Not only could you always rely on him, but he saved us many times. We couldn’t have done it without him and wouldn’t have wanted to. His contribution was enormous.”

Magicians.co.uk has worked on a variety of feature films and television programmes featuring magic and special effects. For more information and to learn the full story behind the falling orange trick shown in the video visit our Magic Consultants page.

We love to talk to our customers and find out about each event. One way to keep you up-to-date with the latest ideas and give you helpful hints for choosing the most suitable entertainment is social media… or faceblog and twitbook as Grannie calls it!

Magicians.co.uk has a brand new Facebook page which will be updated regularly with info about our entertainers, tips and tricks for event planners and budding magicians, free competitions, giveaways and loads more. Just click the link below to see what all the fuss is about:

Of course, we’re already on Twitter – our Twitter name is @Magicians_co_uk – and once you’re following us you can join in the discussion on magic and other event entertainment, or just say hello and our magicians might even tweet you a trick.

And if you are new to all this then getting set up to join in is easy. Here is a video that we really must show Grannie..!

We’re very proud to entertain on match days at the home of our national sport, Wembley Stadium.

Since 2008, our magicians, mindreaders and caricaturists have entertained over 150,000 guests and other VIPs at Club Wembley and in that time we’ve seen some real magic on the famous pitch too.

Last week our team was back at Wembley for the FA Cup Final sponsored by E.ON, between Portsmouth and Chelsea. Before the turnstiles were opened, one of our magicians snapped this picture of the empty pitch and (if you look carefully!) the man marking the white lines.

If you’re involved with a venue and would like to find out how to add a touch of magic to your regular events, contact our venues team and ask about our regular booking deals.

Magicians.co.uk is an approved supplier at a wide variety of venues including The Magic Circle Headquarters, Home House, Glaziers Hall, The Grove, The Natural History Museum and Wembley Stadium.

The Essential Magic Conference is just around the corner now and the excitement is building. This unmissable event will be the world’s very first web conference for magicians, taking place on 15, 16 and 17 of July 2010.

With 33 of the worlds most exciting and important thinkers in magic discussing ideas and sharing thoughts this event really is ‘Essential’. You will see what you mean when you see the Lineup of Speakers.

We would like to thank and congratulate Luis de Matos for creating this great event and we know that with his name behind it it will be a fantastic success. The Essential Magic Conference will be packed with lectures and demonstrations, with plenty of opportunities for you to interact with the conference speakers.

For more information and to get your access pass visit The Essential Magic Conference Website, but do it now as spaces are limited and we guarantee that you do not want to miss this.

Starting tonight, Derren Brown’s new three-part series will be shown on Channel 4, where he will investigate various claims by individuals who believe that they have paranormal abilities. Derren Brown and his team have created a new genre of mind reader. You only have to type ‘psychological illusionist’ into Google to see all the copycat performers out there but there are only a handful of really original ‘mentalists’ entertaining today and Derren is certainly one of the best.

During this series Derren will explore the abilities of a psychic medium, an unusual Russian treatment that claims to cure blindness and also an American ghost hunter, who believes that he can record messages from ghosts and even photograph them! The series Executive Producers are Derren Brown and Anthony Owen. Anthony Owen is the leading producer of television magic in the UK and an old friend of Magicians.co.uk since he co-founded our company over twenty years ago!

Set your video recorders and find out more at the Derren Brown Blog.