I did a search and didn't turn up any reviews of this DVD in the last year or so, and thought it worth sharing. If there are other reviews already, I'm sorry, but I think it is worth bringing this one up anyway. Long review follows.

Okay, here’s where I’m coming from. I’m new to magic, having only performed for classrooms at my kids’ school during snack times about 9 or 10 different times. The response has me wanting to become a kids’ magician (of which there are currently none in my town). I’ve purchased several books, DVDs and tricks and had a varying degree of success and pleasure learning from each.

I recently purchased Bill Abbott’s set of 2 DVDs hoping to find some good ideas to incorporate into a kids’ routine. I was very pleased and count this as my absolute best DVD purchase so far. I’ll break down my impressions of both DVDs separately.

Close Up:
Mostly cards, with a spongeball routine and a flash paper/ashes in hand routine and a fairly good use of the Buddha Money Papers. The down side of this disk is the production quality. The performance segments were shot live in a restaurant and it looks like a cheap home video camera was used. Understanding that, it does provide a view of what it is like to actually perform the effects for kids who are not the magician’s nephews and looking to give props to Uncle Bill. So, the performance segments were low quality filming (though good performing). The explanation segments are rather amateurishly edited (my degree is in broadcast journalism), but the content is very clear. Sleights are shown from several angles, both slow and up to speed.

-Non-card Tricks: There are three routines that Abbott covers that don’t use a deck of cards.

Spongeballs: A fairly basic routine, but still quite good. The end is a huge handful of small balls, which provides a good “wow” moment. (I don't think this is giving anything away, as it is shown in the demo video for this DVD set.) I personally prefer the sort of routine that ends with all the balls back in my pocket. With Abbott’s routine I fear that I’d lose some balls into other pockets each time I perform. Explanation included good video of the false transfer that is the basic spongeball vanish.

Edwin Alonzo Boyd: This uses the Buddha Money Papers concept to change a photo of a man in jail to a picture of him escaped. I don’t really like this one. The story is a good one and about the strongest presentation I can think of for the effect, but all the folding and unfolding just looks too gimmicky.

Flash: The Ashes In Palm effect with a wonderful, slightly twisted story about Bill’s dog. Flash paper makes this one even more dramatic. Any ashes in palm effect relies on a certain amount of audacity, of course, but this routine provides a great distraction between when you make the move and the reveal and also an explanation for why the ashes end up where they do. Very good routine, but the presentation requires more setup than I am personally wanting to do for such an effect. Still, I may change my mind. Give me an excuse to get some flash paper.

-The Card Tricks: Abbott seems to have worked to come up with effects that can be done with kids using regular playing cards and not lose their interest even if they don’t really know the suits. I personally would look for some different tricks for kids this age range, as I never got much from cards when I was young, but the same tricks would play well to an adult audience. All are based on common sleights and most are worth learning.

The Shadow: Chosen card keeps changing into another card. I’ll be learning this one.

The Autograph: Card to wallet routine. Nice to know how it works. Some very nice subtleties and I may decide to spend the money on the trick wallet. Not sure at this point. Very good explanation of a simple control on the cards. This control is also on Ammar's Card Miracles 2 disk. If it matters to you.

The Ninja Card Trick: A signed card in the deck is stabbed with a ninja sword letter opener through a paper bag. Very visual, probably the best card trick on the disk if performed for a boy. I actually can’t get this one off my mind. A presentation of a basic card-stab with the exotic flavor of the ninja.

Mental Photograph: A picture of a selected card appears on a business card already shown blank. Good way to give a business card, but I don’t really like it for kids. They have to pay attention to suit and number and this is sort of lame for kids. For teens and up, it could be very good, though.

The Great Game: Essentially a prize game with prizes written on the backs of playing cards. It is a fun little game with a give-away for the kid. Not really magical, but still a good way to entertain a kid while he waits for his supper.

Card on Forehead: Is there anyone who doesn’t love this classic bit of silliness? For kids, though, I’d probably use alphabet cards. More accessible to the younger set. Alternatively, use only one suit and let the kid pick a number. With 52 cards in 4 suits, the search for the card is confusing in the wrong way. If they only have to look for the number, it gets a lot simpler.

-Bonus Material: On this disk, most of the bonus material is just presentations of the same tricks on TV show appearances and what-not. Very fun for an alternate view of the performance. All of it is better shot than the demo section at the beginning of the disk. Nice to see some interaction and get an idea of what sort of person Abbott is like. His sense of humor is a lot like mine, really.

Stand Up:
This program essentially has three effects. All are great. There’s a lot of good stuff in the bonus material, too. Production quality and editing were much better on this disk, too. Don’t let the fact that there are only 3 tricks make you think this is not a good disk! The material on here is gold.

The Sponge Snack: A spongeballs from mouth routine that has a good, clear end. Worth seeing just for the fact that there is an end to the trick other than “I guess that’s all the balls I have.” I would not use this one just because I don’t like the whole idea of putting the balls in my mouth. Too bad, in a way, because it really does a nice job (as Abbott points out) of getting the audience to look at your face instead of your hands.

The Thing: I bought the disk for this effect. Anyone who has a basic concept of how the Zombie Ball works will have a good idea of how to make The Thing. However, it is nice to have it shown step by step, to see his routine, and to get some pointers on how to move. This trick alone was worth the price of the DVD. There’s a lot of past discussion about this particular effect, so feel free to search for it. Since I do sew, I feel no desire to buy the rather expensive marketed version of it.

Chico the Mind Reader: I only recently realized how a good puppet routine can add to a kids’ show. I’m not willing to become a vent at this time, wanting to stick to magic. Seeing this routine (that wasn’t even all that interesting to me in concept) has converted me completely. It is a magic trick performed by a cute little monkey puppet. It takes 10-12 minutes and is loaded with silliness. Fantastic. I bought a puppet so I can work on crafting a routine inspired by this one. I’m more in tune with the kids in the “who farted” humor category, so I got a mouse/rat puppet and intend to work from a different angle than the cute factor that Chico has going for him. This trick was my unexpected favorite on the DVD and I was very pleased to see two other performances of it in the bonus material.

Bonus Material:
Professor’s Nightmare with a kid story to frame it. Not the strongest motivation for the trick, but a whole lot better than “hey, look at the ropes change sizes!”

Cut and Restored rope routine with three different cuts. Very nice routine. Has me thinking of changing my rope routine, but I’m not sure yet. Explanation is adequate, though not really in-depth. Having a DVD makes it easy to re-watch the explanation.

There’s a cute little impromptu coin trick that I’ll be practicing for the next time a kid hands me a quarter and asks me to do something.

Bonus! Alternate presentations of Chico! My favorite is the adult audience. Even with Abbott reminding the audience that it is just a puppet, the responses to some of the silly business are wonderful. I think this is the best presentation of the routine on the disk, though there’s certainly humor that is not for kids. Not lewd, but certainly suggestive. I'm amazed that the cute little puppet can play so well for such a wide age range.

Summation: For $40, this DVD set is hands-down the best DVD purchase I have made yet. The useful material abounds. I especially love that Abbott has put enough thought into each of his effects to be able to suggest alternatives in presentation or variations that could be used to make the trick work for a different performer or audience. Abbott markets a package deal for Chico and also for The Thing. If you are unwilling to put together the props yourself, this can be a simple (though spendy) way to get set up. In my case, I don't intend to copy his puppet routine, though I know whatever I come up with will be heavily influenced by Chico. If you are handy, you might be happier making your own distinctive version, and I suspect that Bill Abbott would even agree with that sentiment.

One request: If you live in or around Fairbanks, please don’t buy this disk. I want to keep it to myself locally. ;-)

-Patrick

Patrick,

Thank you for the very thorough(!) and positive review.

Sincerely,

Bill
http://www.billabbottmagic.com

Bill-

You are quite welcome. I keep watching this material and loving it. Most is not too hard (though card sleights don't come easy for someone who did not grow up playing cards!) and I'll stand by what I wrote above about it being my best DVD purchase to date.

One little idea I came up with when I considered doing the Ninja Card Trick in a classroom was not to use the little sword. At the school where I volunteer, this would be a major no-no. I don't even let the kids see my dinky swiss army knife in my pocket. Instead, I have been trying to script something based around chopsticks being the Ninja Magic Wand. With only a little whittling, the tips will pierce cards just fine. Anyway, that's how I intend to use the trick and if anyone else has a problem with the sharp sword, it might work better that way.

Watching the DVDs over again (and again), I am sure you and I would get along great. Your sense of humor is a lot like mine. If you are ever in Fairbanks, please look me up!

One question, if you don't mind. In your packaged version of Chico, I see that you include a broom and dust pan. What is that for?

-Patrick

What an awesome review. Very thorough and insightful. I really like the chopstick idea!!

Bill Abbott has really good products.

This is positively on my to get list.

You won't regret it! Superb work...
There was mention of a booklet called 'Table Magic' by the man himself.
I do hope it will see the light of day.

I had this on my shelf and am enjoying viewing it again.

I just received the DVD set from Bill Abbott and have to say that from all the hype I expected more. As in more video quality, sound quality. I also question some of the hype surrounding a particular routine with a puppet. It had some clever moments, but I've seen other performers get a lot more mileage out of a lot less props. I just think that if a professional chooses to release something it should be of professional quality and these DVD's fall short. Just my opinion.

Hiya. I loved this DVD set and I think my review is somewhere around here. I've a question though. I pulled out the DVDs to watch again and found that the stand up one has clear fault in it that is under the skin, for lack of a better term, on the scanning side of the DVD and it will not play at all because of this discoloration. The close up one played and then went black. While not a reflection on Bill or his material has anyone else had a bad set? I'm rather bummed out because I wanted to work on some of the routines on here.

Cane- I did say in my review that the picture and editing quality was very amateur. As a former broadcaster I do notice these things. That said, the information was adequately communicated and I really do prefer this format to the overly dramatic staged presentations that we have all come to expect from Magic Makers or the canned audiences of L&L productions. There are DVDs out there that are almost nothing but hype. When I see titles that include "ultimate" or "best" or "amazing" I tend to be very skeptical. The magic on this set is strong, the presentations are to real people, the video quality is adequate but not great. I have another DVD with much lower production quality and I feel that the material I got from it is well worth suffering through the home computer production. The point is to get knowledge from it, not just to have it for my personal entertainment.

With the puppet routine, I suspect that if it isn't "you" there won't be much use for it. I think the Chico routine is great. Part of the charm in that routine is probably the range of props that keep surprising and amusing the audience. I could do a puppet routine with just the puppet and a deck of cards, but the comedy is less if I don't have all the silly bits. And if you don't have comedy, what's the point of a monkey puppet anyway?

-Patrick

I love Chico. I've seen Bill Abbott perform it twice now at conventions. It definitely plays.

Having said that, none of the video presentations I've seen (only 3, not all of 'em) comes close to capturing its charm. The one that comes closest is the night club routine, which I admit I love largely because of this one line: "I broke his tail, man!"

I just recieved this a couple of days ago and its fantastic, certainly a new favorite of mine

This is a must have for kids entertainers. Chico was a huge hit this summer in my library shows...as well as the sponge snack (I modified incorporating a few other gimmicks such as silk to ball and Wolf's sponge wand). Out of all of my fancy Axtel puppets and pro vent figures, the one puppet that people talked about and wanted to have their pictures taken with was Chico (to my astonishment). That's the power of a good routine.

Chico is an ingenious prop. It will add so much to your kids show. If you don't have a prop like that get it. Kids will go crazy for it.

Does anyone know where I can purchase Bill Abbott Performs Magic for Kids deluxe dvd set?

I have checked penguin and vanishing magic and they are sold out.

Thanks for any help.

Coach West

Just go to his website billabbottmagic.com and it's there. A very good dvd...just not so great for very young children in my opinion.