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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Entertainment
Lucy Mangan

Miracles review – surely they could’ve found a better way to reward charity workers than magic tricks?

Steven Frayne, the magician formerly known as Dynamo, with Brentford Penguins FC – a football club for children with Down’s Syndrome.
Steven Frayne, the magician formerly known as Dynamo, with Brentford Penguins FC – a football club for children with Down’s Syndrome. Photograph: Chris Lobina/Sky

There are two kinds of people in this world – those who lean in to the magician’s world of tricks and illusion and those who immediately start to take it apart, explain how it must have been done and remind everyone that: “It’s not real!” The second group are among the worst people in the world. If you have any of them in your life, cut them out now. If they cannot understand the point of theatre, if they cannot see something amazing without wanting to dissect and destroy it, if they feel the need to point out that a woman cannot actually be sawn in half or a rabbit pulled from an ordinary top hat – well, they do not think much of you, my friend.

So, then, to Miracles – a Christmas special showcasing the skills of the magician Steven Frayne (AKA Dynamo) as he travels up and down the country, entertaining people on the streets with astonishing card and other tricks. These include flinging someone’s ring around a bottle neck; making a pack of cards fly out of a glass to leave behind only the one named by a passerby; and changing the names of public wifi networks on everyone’s phones to the name of one woman’s dog.

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