Questions and Answers with Illusionist Sam Pearce
How long have you been doing magic?
Ever since I can remember! I performed my first (paying) magic show, eleven years ago at a child’s birthday party in my home town of Kincardine. Although, that wasn’t my first magic show… I have a home video, filmed when I was five or six, showing me performing some magic tricks in my living room for my parents. As my relatives recall, ever since I could talk I was putting on shows for family and friends.
What is the furthest you’ve travelled by road for a show?
My crew and I traveled 4,155 KM away from home to Fort St. John, British Columbia, Canada.
Your favourite part of being a magician?
Performing! Being on stage and making people laugh and most of all, entertaining them!
Your least favourite part of being a magician?
The hours upon hours of exhausting traveling by road or air and having to lug around and set up the heavy equipment. (It’s much worse in the rain or snow!)
How do you learn your magic and come up with new ideas?
I read books about magic, consult with other magicians and work with my Creative Director to create new routines for my show. Every now and then Ill come up with an idea for something I want to add to the show… The following months are filled with designing and fabricating the equipment then scripting and choreographing the routine. The new piece is then added to the show and is constantly reviewed and revised according to audience response.
What is one thing that people don’t know and you wish they did?
I wish people knew how many hours of work I dedicate to my show. Minor details consume hours of attention and excessive rehearsal is a must. I’m constantly working on my show along with my Creative Director and I have a firm belief that what I do can always be improved.
What is the funniest thing that has happened on stage?
At the time, it wasn’t very funny, but in retrospect, I can laugh about it…
Two years ago I was performing in Barrie, Ontario for about 400 people as part of my Benefit Show Tour. I do a routine in my show in which I invite a child on stage and put his or her shoe inside my latest invention, the Water Injection Zion Kinetic Water Trapping Equipment, a shoe cleaning machine. I start the machine and turn the knobs on the front to maximum power.
The lights flash and you can hear the machine working. All of a sudden, the lights stop and the machine goes silent as smoke slowly rises from inside the machine. I lift the lid of the machine, the sides fall down and sitting there is their shoe, burnt to a crisp. This is usually followed by laughter and then after some magic, the child gets their shoe back good as new!
That night in Barrie, I had a five or six year old boy on stage, who had volunteered and let me put his shoe inside the machine, let’s call him Mark. The machine was smoking so I lifted the lid off to reveal the burnt shoe. Mark starts crying. Not just a little, but a lot. He started bawling his eyes out as I can vividly recall. I finally calm him down we proceed with the trick, going as fast as I can so I can give him his shoe back. I’m just moments away from giving Mark his shoe back and he starts crying, again. Only this time, he runs off the stage back to his parents sitting in the first few rows of the audience.
It was an interesting moment, making a child cry in front of 400 people because I burned his shoe to a crisp. Thankfully the audience was very sympathetic and after a shared laugh I made Marks shoe appear and give it to him as he comes to the front of the stage.
After the show I met Mark and his parents and I was able to thank him for his help on stage; I gave him some magic tricks from the merchandise table so he could learn to do magic for his family and friends.
It was the first time and hopefully the last time I’ve ever made a child cry on stage and I’ll never forget it.
