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‘How did he do that?’ Words rarely uttered around the naked male body in this Anti-Expert Era. But there’s little room for disbelief at this showiest of magic shows – there’s barely space for a black hat. Because, in case the name didn’t give up the game, The Naked Magicians bring more full-frontal nudity to the West End than ‘Equus’. Dynamo, meet Magic Mike.
Cheeky Aussie duo Chris and (conveniently enough) Mike waggle their wands in a performance packed with everything from ‘Carry On’-style jokes of the wink-wink, nudge-nudge variety to nastier stuff that would make Barbara Windsor blush. Audience participation is essential to the show, so there’s little room for prudes, especially once the layers start coming off. Luckily, the crowd is peppered with up-for-it Aussies – these guys are clearly popular back home – whooping like a Brighton hen do.
Any ‘Arrested Development’ fans should get off on Chris and Mike’s pastiche of sad, sexy magician Gob Bluth. But unlike Gob, these guys have tricks that mostly hit the mark. It’s a modern style of magic, with mind-reading, disappearing acts (no guesses for where items turn up later on), card tricks and stunts with sharp objects (ouch). But that’s if you can concentrate on what’s going on.
The thing that makes this potentially cringe combo of nudity and magic manageable is this duo, whose comic timing is way more impeccable than their, err, sleight of hand. They’ve got talent, all right. Make no mistake, this is GNO (girls’/gays’ night out) territory. But if dicks and tricks are your thing, you might even come again.