Review: 'Penn & Teller on Broadway'
IT HAS LONG been accepted that the only two absolutes in life are death and taxes. But here's a third: It's impossible for a Penn & Teller performance to be anything less than mesmerizing, mind-boggling and wildly entertaining.
IT HAS LONG been accepted that the only two absolutes in life are death and taxes. But here's a third: It's impossible for a Penn & Teller performance to be anything less than mesmerizing, mind-boggling and wildly entertaining.
Such was the case when the one-of-a-kind magic-comedy duo started making a name for itself in the 1980s, and it applies to "Penn & Teller on Broadway," which runs through Aug. 16 at Gotham's Marquis Theatre.
The program - which celebrates the 40th anniversary of the teaming of garrulous wise-guy Penn Jillette and the single-named, publicly mute Teller - is a potent blend of decades-old routines (that are anything but) and pieces of far more recent vintage.
The show, which is recommended for kids 8 and older, gets off to a typically mind-blowing start as the pair somehow relocate an audience member's cellphone to a most unlikely hiding place (we'll say no more than that there's something fishy about the trick). From there, the fun escalates as Penn & Teller perform 16 more illusions that hopscotch between head-scratching and hilarious (often within the same bit).
One of the many ways Penn & Teller have separated themselves from others in the world of hocus-pocus is with their penchant for debunking the work of many of their colleagues, and showing audiences exactly how illusions are executed. But even when they are giving us a glimpse behind the scenes, they nonetheless knock it out of the park, as with their classic "seven steps of magic" segment that deconstructs a sleight-of-hand trick.
But they are at their absolute best when performing astounding feats of legerdemain, whether it's Jillette (who has lost more than 100 pounds) ascertaining punchlines to gags silently read by random audience members from joke books (there is no act in show business that involves the paying customers more than these guys) to Teller's two four-decades-old signature bits: The one in which he swallows 100 needles and regurgitates them threaded onto a length of dental floss, and the turn involving a silhouette of a flower projected onto a screen.
In a world of uncertainty, constant change and doubt, it's reassuring to know that there's at least one thing on which we can always depend: Penn & Teller's singular act is family friendly entertainment at its absolute best.