Larry Wilson "Birth of a Magical Entertainer" Show #223

On this show my good Friend Larry Wilson explains how as a child he discoverd magic and kind's fell into performing. Of course that led to a life-long career as an entertainer and being chosen Comic/Magician of the Year 2019.
Very funny stories and good information...Enjoy, Listen & Share!

Larry Wilson, a professional magician who embarked on his magical journey at the tender age of eight or nine, believes that the allure of magic intensifies during puberty. He views magic as a powerful tool for preteens to forge a unique identity, offering them a sense of empowerment and belonging during a time often marked by uncertainty and a lack of control. Wilson's early experiences performing at kids' birthday parties honed his skills in audience management, a critical asset that helped him transition from an enthusiastic teenager to a professional magician. For Wilson, magic is not just a form of entertainment but also a means of social interaction and personal development, enabling young individuals to navigate the complexities of adolescence with a touch of wonder and mystery.

(00:01:49) Supernatural Abilities and Adolescent Exploration

(00:08:17) Dual-Brain Operation in Magic Performance

(00:13:30) Transformative Secrets of Illusionary Magic

(00:24:10) Theatrical Presentation and Supernatural Belief in Magic

(00:29:30) Magic Journey: From Childhood Tricks to Comedy

(00:33:39) Practical Experience and Continuous Learning in Showbiz

Transcript

Announcer: 0:04

This is another episode of stand up comedy. Your host in MC, celebrating 40 plus years on the fringe of show business. Stories, interviews and comedy sets from the famous and not so famous. Here's your host and MC, Scott Edwards.

R. Scott Edwards: 0:22

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the first in a series on the art form, comedy and magic. And with us today is one of the celebrity comic magicians of this country. He was the 2019 comic Magician of the year, and he's here to tell us how he got into magic originally. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome Larry Wilson.

Larry Wilson: 0:47

Oh, thank you. You're too kind. Please, everyone, sit down. Please sit down.

R. Scott Edwards: 0:52

Larry, it's good to have you on this podcast. We're going to be just talking about comedy and magic and how those two art forms have mixed to make really a whole new type of variety entertainment. How did Larry Wilson become a magician?

Larry Wilson: 1:09

Well, I became a magician, I think, like many, many young boys do, eight, nine years old. There's great fascination with magic now. Recently, I've seen more and more girls getting interested in it, but when I was growing up, it seemed to be the exclusive province of boys. And, you know, part of it's interesting because you see this all the time. I have a theory about this, like I do about so many.

R. Scott Edwards: 1:47

Oh, well, let's hear the theory.

Larry Wilson: 1:49

There's a great interest in learning magic with the impending onset of puberty. And I think it's because it's a time when you feel you have very.

R. Scott Edwards: 2:04

Little personal power, low self esteem.

Larry Wilson: 2:07

Well, you might not even have low self esteem. You just, you can't drive a car. You don't have a job, you don't have any money. You don't know how things work. You don't know what to say or do in social situations. And I think that magic provides two parallel tracks for you. One conscious and one's unconscious. The conscious one is it gives you something to do. It gives you, like, an identity. Oh, he's the guy who does magic. Oh, oh, do a trick or do a card trick. Oh, oh, you know, and, oh, we want to invite him to the party. Oh, you want him in this club. And suddenly, for so many pubescent and preteens who feel sort of directionless or maybe not like they belong, it gives them an identity. It gives them something that they can be identified with. But then I think also unconsciously, and I don't think most magicians are aware of this. I think psychologically, you're mimicking the role of someone who has supernatural abilities and that really you're not consciously aware of it. But the idea is very appealing that I can do things that normal people cannot. What's funny about this, of course, this is kind of leads directly into comedy magic because even as a kid I found that whole absurd sort of notion.

R. Scott Edwards: 3:57

So what age were you? I mean, you mentioned some from eight, some at twelve. What age did you kind of pick up?

Larry Wilson: 4:04

Well, I think about magic, eight or nine. Yeah.

R. Scott Edwards: 4:07

Okay. So you start to practicing in your room, you're learning some tricks, maybe showing them to the family. What's the next step? Is it doing the school variety show or something?

Larry Wilson: 4:22

Well, I think probably the logical progression. And also have to stop you when you say, oh, doing tricks, the femme stuff, there's some other elements to it. Again, I think this is psychological, but there's a desiree to learn secrets, to have arcane knowledge revealed to you and so on.

R. Scott Edwards: 4:46

Interesting.

Larry Wilson: 4:47

Well, on a real practical level, yes, you're going to learn. Now, when I was growing up and doing it, it was pre computer, pre video. So you had to learn from books or if you were lucky enough to know a real magician, someone who could teach you. But I, that was very rare. So mostly it was from books you saw. And of course, what was so funny is there's some brilliant magicians, genius magicians, but they weren't good writers, so reading their books is very frustrating.

R. Scott Edwards: 5:19

And they're probably a little more technical and not really, oh my God, you know, explaining. Well, it's funny because I've even, you know, Penn and Teller is kind of famous for we're going to explain how a trick is done. And yet really, when they're explaining the trick, it doesn't really help because unless you know the secret, unless you know the magic, they can explain all they want. It doesn't, it's not like them doing it, right.

Larry Wilson: 5:44

And sometimes they're talking theory, you know, which if you are a magician and you've done it enough, that makes sense to you. But for the most part, what we refer to as the lay public, meaning, I guess the word nowadays people use as muggles, you know, non magicians. Some of that theory doesn't connect, doesn't make any sense at all. But what's so fascinating to me is this desire to learn arcane secrets, to have them revealed to me. This directly leads into discovery of opposite sex.

R. Scott Edwards: 6:27

The timing, that's what I was wondering. Was it? I know that some magicians think that learning a few magic tricks might make it easier to meet girls or at least communicate with girls, and that's like.

Larry Wilson: 6:40

Something to say well, it's like the.

R. Scott Edwards: 6:42

Class clown that maybe the future comic, if he can be funny in class, like you said, it gives him a personality or gives him a connection with the other classmates, but also it might soften up the opposite sex, male or female, in having something to talk about. Oh, you know, you did that trick. I saw that, and boom, there's a conversation. It's not like how you want to hold hands, and everybody goes, right?

Larry Wilson: 7:14

And no one knows exactly what to say. So it gives you a framework, and it gives you an identity. But it's really interesting because, of course, when you start to learn these arcane secrets, they're incredibly disappointing.

R. Scott Edwards: 7:33

I want to share something that maybe it's too early in the series to share. Never too early, but you've hit upon it. I love magic. I've always loved magic, and my dad knows I love magic and gave me a couple tricks not even when I was young, just in my life. And I've gotten a couple tricks. They've even had some magicians show me a couple tricks. And for me, I can't do magic because once I knew the secret, I'm like, the magic's gone for me. And so I'm trying to show somebody, and in my hyatt, I'm going, you can't figure out what I'm doing, you know, and it stops me from being a good performer because I'm like, this is so obvious.

Larry Wilson: 8:17

Well, now you've. You've opened the Pandora's box here, because the thing that no one ever talks about with magic is that if you're doing it and you're doing it successfully, there's two. Again, this is the parallel tracks. Two halves of your brain have to be operating in synchronization, but they're doing totally different things. One half your brain is thinking about performing what it's supposed to look like. It looks like I'm putting this coin from my right hand into my left hand. So you have to be thinking the other half of your brain is thinking about what you're actually doing. I'm withholding the coin and only appearing to put it in my left hand, and it's leaving a latent image in the viewer's eye that they swear they saw it go in there. Both things have to be happening in concert without interruption.

R. Scott Edwards: 9:26

So what you're saying is I'm brain damaged and I couldn't do that.

Larry Wilson: 9:29

No, no. It's that you're really focused and that when you're practicing magic, it's a really difficult thing. To do, because frequently one side will become dominant. You'll be performing beautifully. I was hired once and flown to Europe to work with a performer who had a tv show coming up who knew me and had seen all my stuff. And so he brought me over, and he had an incredible routine, hilarious routine, but he'd over rehearsed it so that he was now, like, on autopilot. And it just, it had a weird.

R. Scott Edwards: 10:10

Robotic quality, so wasn't selling like it should.

Larry Wilson: 10:13

Right. And so, you know, we talked about this, and he was very defensive about it, and I wasn't criticizing him. I just said, we got to get you back to being in the moment and really be. And I knew what I just described with you, those two things happening together. I said, I thought, I got to break this so that he's starting again. And so we did a bunch of different exercises, and he was very resistant to this. I finally said, you know what I want you to do? I want you to do this whole routine, but do it as someone else. And he said, oh, that's stupid. I said, yes, it is, and I'm stupid, but I'd like you to do it anyway. And he said, well, I don't really do, like, impressions. I said, I know, I want you to do it anyway. So, like, for 45 minutes, we were arguing about this, and, you know, it's just, you know, the resistance of the mind. And he was saying, you know, this is, there's nothing will come. I said, you're right. Nothing will come of it. Now let's just do it anyway. And he finally said, look, if I. If I. I said, you can do it like any. Do it like Frankenstein. Do it like Clint Eastwood. Do it. I just want you out of yourself. Right? And, you know, he was. Had many elaborate theories about why I was foolish and this wouldn't work, and I agreed. I said, you're absolutely right. Now let's just do it anyway. And finally he said, if I could do an impression of someone, I would do it, but I don't. I said, oh, I hear what you're saying. So if I could think of someone you could do an improvisation of, then you do it. He goes, yeah. I said, okay. I said, do it like David Copperfield. And he was trapped because every magician in the world knows Copperfield, has seen him and knows all these mannerisms and his whole style, right? So he did it as David Cotfield, and it was amazing. It was incredible. And it was a sawing and a half routine, and he was incredible. It suddenly came to life and I knew that I had done it correctly because afterwards he said, well, he said, yeah, that was kind of interesting. I said, there's a funny thing you may not have realized you did. He said, what's that? I said, you forgot to saw the girl in half. And he looked at me like, what? And I turn around and she was still in the box. And I said, you did everything else perfectly, but your brain couldn't do those two things together because you're doing it fresh like it was the first time.

R. Scott Edwards: 12:51

Right.

Larry Wilson: 12:51

And it's a very tricky thing to do if you've never done this before. But that's at a very high level. That's at an expert level. But seriously, when you first start learning this stuff, the secrets, and that's what everyone thinks, that's what's so funny, you know, because of Harry Potter, everyone thinks, oh, secrets. I wish I knew some of the Harry Potter spells, you know.

R. Scott Edwards: 13:19

Yeah.

Larry Wilson: 13:20

I wish I could conjure them up. I can only think of ones that are inappropriate and won't be correct, but.

R. Scott Edwards: 13:28

Ridiculous, you know, things like that, well.

Larry Wilson: 13:30

They sound like Latin, you know, and everyone thinks, oh, physio or something. Right. Once I learn those secrets, all this stuff will happen. No, what you learn are really disappointing, banal, mundane things that, done in the correct order and in the correct presentation, create an illusion. And the illusion is so powerful, if it's done correctly, that the viewer perceives something that just isn't true. There's a great quote from Houdini who said, what the eye sees and the ear hears, the mind believes. And it's true that when you said yourself, this is a very common thing where you're saying that you're disappointed when you were doing the magic because you didn't have experience the magic. Well, no, that's the saddest part of it.

R. Scott Edwards: 14:31

That's interesting.

Larry Wilson: 14:32

When I see great magicians, it's so thrilling, it's so enjoyable. And sometimes I feel so bitterly disappointed thinking I'm gonna have to learn that. And once I learn it, I won't feel this way because now it becomes a completely different experience. Now, there are some people I enjoy seeing. I just worked at the magic castle with a woman from China, a woman named Juliana Chen, and she did some stuff that was so fantastic.

R. Scott Edwards: 15:06

She was amazing. Thanks to you, Jill and I were able to, on her anniversary, see that show. We saw her with you on the show, and as amazing as you were, it was a different style of magic that was very beautiful.

Larry Wilson: 15:23

It was very beautiful. And some highly technical stuff. And what made me think of her just now is I could watch Julianna Chen over and over and over, because although the illusionary stuff she did was great, some of the highly technical stuff, it's like watching somebody shoot a free throw, you know?

R. Scott Edwards: 15:46

Right. It may look easy, but you know that, you know, we couldn't do it ten times in a row, and a pro could.

Larry Wilson: 15:54

Right. I mean, how many thousands of hours? I mean, and to see her moving around the stage, and I could just see that every single movement she was doing had been thought out. None of it was by accident. She put her hand on her hip and turned her shoulder, and I could see, oh, this is for a very specific purpose that's helping this. You know, so that kind of stuff I love to see over and over. But you know what I was just saying to you, I remember as a kid, this also sounds weird to people who are listening, who are under 40, but we used to get catalogs, you know, hard copy catalogs.

R. Scott Edwards: 16:36

Right, right.

Larry Wilson: 16:37

Oh, my God. To get a magic catalog filled with these fantastic illustrations. And the illustrations took a little liberty with the reality of what was happening. Exactly. And the descriptions of them, every single description, made it sound like these are miracles. These are incredible things to see. And so you think, oh, yes. Oh, my God, I want the. And they also would have these fanciful names, you know, the cylinders of Kundahar. And you go, oh, my God, I've got to have the cylinders of. So then you'd order this, and a few weeks later in the mail, you'd receive a box that had, like, a piece of scotch tape and a safety pin and some badly typed out instructions, and you go, this is the cylinder of condo. Well, yeah. When you read the instructions, you put the piece of tape on this thing. You put the safety pin on this. You do. And so it's interesting in so many ways because you realize that hopefully, eventually, you realize now, I know there's some people who had that same experience and immediately lost interest in magic. They wanted real leviosum.

R. Scott Edwards: 17:55

Leviosia.

Larry Wilson: 17:56

Right, right. They wanted real magic. Well, sorry, that we can't do for 695. Okay, that's not gonna happen. Right. But for some of us, there was a really interesting experience of saying, oh, this is a theatrical illusion you're creating. And so.

R. Scott Edwards: 18:17

That's a good point. The theatrics, the presentation, the patter, the timing, all the things that'll be discussed on this podcast are so crucial to what makes a trick work or not.

Larry Wilson: 18:31

This sounds like a very exciting podcast.

R. Scott Edwards: 18:35

Well, tell you what, we didn't quite get to what I wanted to get to. You're now a young teenager. You've kind of found magic. You've been practicing a few tricks. I asked in the last of the series what your next step was, and then we kind of went off.

Larry Wilson: 18:51

So well, I expect there's going to be a lot of going off here. But that is the benefit of having the preeminent comedy magician in the entire world here at your disposal, is that there's a lot.

R. Scott Edwards: 19:06

Thank you, Mister Modest.

Larry Wilson: 19:07

It's the very least I can do. The truth is that there's a lot of different pathways to go down here, because the deeper you get into magic, the more interesting it really is. And in my career, I also experiment with stuff like I'm always interested in. From the very beginning, when I started performing professionally, I was very interested in trying to use props that didn't seem like magic. Props?

R. Scott Edwards: 19:40

Oh, we've seen other people, oh, I've got this mixer out of the drawer or a spatula, or there's a book over there, and all of a sudden magic happens, and you're thinking, how'd they do that with my book?

Larry Wilson: 19:55

Right, exactly. And to me, there's a. A popular trend nowadays that I don't completely understand, but I think it's ill conceived. And that is, I see a lot of young performers, men and women, who are very eager to promote the idea that what they do isn't really supernatural in any way. I don't have special powers. I've just learned some skills to do this.

R. Scott Edwards: 20:30

So they're kind of taking away the illusion, the fantasy.

Larry Wilson: 20:35

I don't think they're aware of it, but yes.

R. Scott Edwards: 20:37

Oh, okay.

Larry Wilson: 20:38

Okay. And I think it may have to do with some modern notion of transparency or something, but they're missing the point. And worse, I think they're shooting themselves in the foot. What we do. You know, Scott, if you go and see a production of Hamlet, you don't really think the guy playing Hamlet is a danish prince. Okay?

R. Scott Edwards: 21:07

Right.

Larry Wilson: 21:07

We are suspending our disbelief because it's entertainment. It's entertainment. We know he's not danish. He's speaking English. We know he's not a prince. He's in this little equity waiver, 99 cent, 99 person theater.

R. Scott Edwards: 21:27

You mean somebody doesn't actually die on stage? Each and every performance.

Larry Wilson: 21:31

Thank you. I mean, that's the real thing. All these people in Hamline who get skewered get up at the end of the show and take a bow in the curtain call. So. But for some reason, I see a lot of younger magicians. Now, I'm not suggesting that I'm a trying to start my own cult or church, saying I heard really crazy stories. Who was that guy? Jim Jones, the people's temple. Apparently, he had some magic tricks that a lot of people don't know this, but that at his church, the people's temple, he would do some close up magic tricks but present them as real.

R. Scott Edwards: 22:15

I did not know that.

Larry Wilson: 22:16

Yeah. And that is for.

R. Scott Edwards: 22:19

Excuse the judgment. Yes, but for the ignorant people that were sucked in by Jim Jones and stuff. The fact that he's saying that I'm actually a God and I, or, you know, a prophet.

Larry Wilson: 22:36

Right.

R. Scott Edwards: 22:36

I have some powers. And then he does basic coin trick or something. Yeah. And it's in the people that are already bought into the crazy story that's been given to them. They're like, oh, you know, it's like validation.

Larry Wilson: 22:56

Absolutely.

R. Scott Edwards: 22:57

You know, he, he says he's special, and then he does that. Wow.

Larry Wilson: 23:01

Well, I. My guess is, I don't know for sure. I've only read this in a couple different places. But my guess is that he wouldn't do it as a formal presentation. It would be the sort of thing that would seem to be impromptu for a special group as a unique kind of offhand. So later on, these people are relating miracles to other. Let me tell you something. Jim isn't like a regular man. I saw him levitate this ring. I was standing right there. I didn't just hear about it. I saw it. I took my ring off. I set it on his hand. It floated. He concentrated. He looked. When you really are selling this strong, the illusions can be mesmerizing. Well, I mean, you've seen me, I do stuff, but I present my stuff for entertainment as comedy. But I still think that theatrically, we should be presenting ourselves as someone who can do supernatural things.

R. Scott Edwards: 24:10

Right. Because you have to sell the illusion. That's the whole entertainment aspect. Just like Hamlet on stage. You have to sell that. You're watching a 16th century situation happening. If you don't buy into it, it's not as entertaining.

Larry Wilson: 24:25

Well, I'm with you, but like I say, I see a number of young people who, very talented, have some incredible skills, and they're kind of shunting that aside. And I think, wow. I mean, now, you'll notice I don't name names when it's somebody that I might cast in a bad light because I don't want to embarrass anyone. But I know a guy who's very talented. He's been around for years who I thought could have been a huge breakout star in magic. But he insisted on this weird thing of, yeah, I'm not doing anything you couldn't do. I just have, you know, I've learned these things and I've practiced these things and I think it served him psychologically some way of making him feel like he was a superior being because he could think better than you could or something. But he missed the point of what we're doing. We're supposed to be entertainers.

R. Scott Edwards: 25:29

Yeah, I mean, it's. I mean, I don't mean to interject, but like juggling or stand up comedy or ventriloquism. You know, ventriloquism might be a great example. It looks magical. It looks like this wooden dummy is talking and alive. It's a technique, but you have to sell it. It's theatrical. It's entertainment magic. If I just went up and said, here's an ace of spades, and now it's gone, may amaze some five year old or something, but to be entertainment, you have to make it theatrical.

Larry Wilson: 26:05

Right. Well, it's funny because, like you just said, you hold something up and then it's gone. If you're presenting this as I just have certain skills you don't have now, it becomes a puzzle. It's not entertaining or arrogance. Well, yeah, at its worst, it's, you.

R. Scott Edwards: 26:23

Know, it's kind of a, you know, I mean, some people don't like magic because, you know, someone's going to trick me on purpose and make me feel stupid.

Larry Wilson: 26:32

Right.

R. Scott Edwards: 26:32

And there are some people, a lot of people don't like magic for that reason. But when you're arrogant like that and you're doing it with that attitude now, you're turning off a much larger percentage of the audience because you're ahead. You're not entertaining. You're like, yeah, hey, I have a talent. I've learned to do this and you don't. Na na na na na.

Larry Wilson: 26:51

Well, no, you're exactly, when I first worked with Jerry Seinfeld many, many years ago, I remember he was saying exactly what you're saying. He's saying magicians sort of go, look, here's a coin. Now it's gone. You're a jerk.

R. Scott Edwards: 27:06

Now it's back.

Larry Wilson: 27:07

You're an idiot. Right. And he's right. That there are people who do that and that's not entertaining. We don't enjoy that. Right. But it's so strange because it's a fine line in other words, I know people who will do, who use certain magic effects in service of making themselves seem like they somehow have special powers. And to me, this may lead directly into the, of the nature of the show about comedy magic. To me, that premise is hysterically funny. It's already, it's the height of absurdity that says I have supernatural powers and I'm going to use them to change this stick of gumdeh into a pencil. That's what you're going to use your supernatural powers for. What about making yourself invisible and going into this bank and stealing money?

R. Scott Edwards: 28:17

How about world peace?

Larry Wilson: 28:19

Like, there's a million things you could do. Oh, I'm going to change this blue scarf into a red one. That's the best you can. Now, to me, just that concept, the absurdity of someone who has supernatural powers and uses them for the most mundane and trivial things, that's hysterically funny.

R. Scott Edwards: 28:45

And that brings us back to comedy magic. But as usual with you, Larry, we've drifted a bit. I just want to give the audience a foundation. So taking you back to high school, when was, how did you get your first professional gig? How did that lead to your career? Now, you, and maybe you need to explain this. You're not a straight magician because of what you just said. You believe in the entertaining absurdity of, ooh, this is magic. And so that makes a comedy. At what point in this transition from teenager that's learning a few tricks to performing in front of an audience to becoming a pro, did all this work out for you?

Larry Wilson: 29:30

Well, like many, many magicians, I think the earliest shows you wind up doing are for other kids birthday parties. So when you're twelve, you may do a birthday party for a bunch of seven year olds. And this is, of course, very good training, because if you can control seven year olds, you can control any grown up audience. And I always, I never had any intention of doing this professionally. I meet magicians all the time who, it's like their goal in life, they wanted to be a professional magician. And I feel a little bad because I wish I knew what that felt like. I never wanted to be a professional magician. I just thought it was fun. I liked doing it. There are a lot of things I like to do, right. But when I was in my teens in southern California, some people took me to the Renaissance pleasure fair.

R. Scott Edwards: 30:34

Ooh, remember those?

Larry Wilson: 30:36

Yeah. And I thought that was such a charming thing. And one of the things I really liked is that there were a lot of street performers in the Renaissance fair.

R. Scott Edwards: 30:45

Yeah. Those events have jugglers and pantomime people.

Larry Wilson: 30:50

Oh, they have every. But there's a lot of them who are scheduled on stages, but there are also others who just are working in.

R. Scott Edwards: 30:58

The stage, mingling with the crowd, the.

Larry Wilson: 30:59

Way they might have really done during the renaissance. And so I thought, oh, I could do that. And so I whipped some things together.

R. Scott Edwards: 31:08

And were you in appropriate attire?

Larry Wilson: 31:11

Of course. Of course. And so I just thought there was something, this is clearly character logical about me, and I can't quite explain what it is, but I like to create my own opportunities. I'm not particularly good. Like, for example, in, I've done hundreds of television appearances, but almost always as Larry Wilson, comedy magician. I'm not good at auditioning because you have to. I mean, obviously, this is not the way you're supposed to do it, but I was always in audition trying to figure out what they wanted. Well, it was only after I'd been in doing this for 20 or 30 years, I figured out they don't know what they want, all right?

R. Scott Edwards: 32:02

Especially in professional showbiz.

Larry Wilson: 32:04

Oh, my God.

R. Scott Edwards: 32:05

That's why they keep repeating the same crap.

Larry Wilson: 32:07

Well, not only that, but that's why they want to see so many people. They're hoping you're going to bring something that they didn't think of. Well, I never realized that I'm looking going, you know, what's the right thing to do? Well, that's obviously the wrong way to approach it. So I don't think I've ever gotten anything by auditioning, ever. And so for me, something like the Renaissance fair where I thought, oh, now, I probably was supposed to audition for someone to be given permission to do this, but I just sort of bypassed that. And I also thought it was so interesting to me to perform for 510 minutes and then pass the hat. And it was a very interesting learning experience, because if the hat came back with a lot of money in it, it meant they liked what you did, and if it didn't come back with a lot of money, it meant they didn't like what you did. So you could argue whatever you want, and you could have theories, and you could have all kinds of ideas. But the hat doesn't lie.

R. Scott Edwards: 33:18

Ah.

Larry Wilson: 33:18

You know, and so that's the name.

R. Scott Edwards: 33:20

Of a book down the road.

Larry Wilson: 33:21

It could very well be. I'm sure someone's already written it. But I thought it was so interesting, and also, I thought it was so interesting because doing a short show, 510 minutes, you would have the opportunity to correct the mistakes you just made, right.

R. Scott Edwards: 33:39

Because you're performing over and over and over, which is, you know, everybody in any industry and show business, it's all about stage time, people, whether it's stand up comedy, ventriloquism, juggling, getting on stage, doing your act over and over and over. That's how it works out. The pattern, the timing, all that stuff and magic. It's extremely important.

Larry Wilson: 33:59

Well, but more than anything, the ability to interact with the audience and control the audience. When Mike Lacey opened the comedy magic club in Hermosa Beach, I can't remember what year this is. The pleistocene era of some kind. He hired me before the club opened me, Bruce Baum and Jim Samuels, to do great setup, some street shows.

R. Scott Edwards: 34:28

Oh, really?

Larry Wilson: 34:29

On the beach? And God bless them. You know, Bruce Baum, of course, hilarious.

R. Scott Edwards: 34:36

And a great guy and almost all prop comic. In those days, that would have worked on the beach, right?

Larry Wilson: 34:42

But they had never done any street perform. Oh, well, I'd had all this background working the Renaissance fair. And like I said, people would comment later. Sometimes they'd say to me, guys who knew me would say, I can't believe how many shows you do in a day. And I was thinking, well, these are all just training for me every time I do it. And I see, oh, you could do that differently. You could do this better. What if you change it? Like, I immediately want to do it again so that I can see how to improve it. So I might do 15 or 20 shows in a day, which is crazy. You know, a normal person shouldn't do that. But to me, I want to try that again. I want to write. So I learned exactly how to control these crowds going by, and I remember both Bruce and Jim were kind of goggle eyed with amazement, like they didn't know. I said, you guys don't know how to draw a crowd here. I said, oh, watch. And I just got this huge crowd, and then I turned them. I said, they're all yours. Right. You know.

R. Scott Edwards: 35:56

Well, that's fascinating. Well, going back to, first off, street performing, we both know several very successful comic magicians. Harry Anderson, who people may remember from cheers and night court.

Larry Wilson: 36:09

Sure.

R. Scott Edwards: 36:09

Amazing. Jonathan, who had his own show in Vegas for over 14 years, Penn and Teller, who are world famous, all got their start. The streets. There's such a learning curve that when you're having to grab a crowd, entertain the crowd, pass the hat, the hat doesn't lie, and you're trying to make a living and pay your rent from that. So you're really having to work it and not get arrested, right? You have to really that is something that really can help you hone your skills. And then just to add a little levity to this part two of the series, I'm going to share that. I used to go to the Renaissance fair, and I'm not a performer, but it was during. We're huge fans of Monty Python, so I would dress up as just the, the lowliest of low people, and I would sit in the mud, in the straw, and I had a handful of rocks and I go, pebbles. Pebbles for sale. Extremely small rocks. And people would stand around, would take pictures, sometimes throw a little money at us. But we were just having so much fun kind of doing this Monty Python ripoff. In going into character at the Renaissance.

Larry Wilson: 37:33

Fair, well, you just, you kind of just put your finger on it that there's different kinds of performing. But what you just described is the performing that's most appealing to me, which is playing.

R. Scott Edwards: 37:52

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Larry Wilson: 37:53

And that is, to me, it's the thing I enjoy the most sometimes when I'm performing. I know you've seen this because you've seen me. I may interrupt myself by laughing because something that's going on strikes me as funny. I'm not going to try and conceal that. It's either someone's response to me, either.

R. Scott Edwards: 38:17

You're in the moment.

Larry Wilson: 38:20

I mean, I know a lot of people who approach this like a nine to five job, and I think that may be not the most fun way to do it. If you want a nine to five job, there's a whole lot easier jobs in show business. If you're going to put up with all the vagaries of show business, you ought to at least have more fun.

R. Scott Edwards: 38:43

Exactly.

Larry Wilson: 38:44

I can tell you, I hadn't thought of this in a million years. But when you're talking about passing the hat and doing, I remember I keep saying stuff that makes me sound like I'm incredibly ancient. There was a time once, many, many years ago, where Southwest Airlines used to fly a flight between LA and San Francisco called the midnight flyer.

R. Scott Edwards: 39:11

Oh, I didn't know that.

Larry Wilson: 39:13

What it was is they had some contract with the us post office where they were delivering mail, and some genius realized, you know, we could sell these empty seats to people since we are already paid to fly the cargo of the, of the mail back and forth. Now, this seemed like a wild and revolutionary idea. The flight was at midnight. They thought, who's going to want to fly at midnight? Well, it turns out a bunch of freaks did like me. It cost $10.

R. Scott Edwards: 39:42

Wow.

Larry Wilson: 39:43

You would just get on the flight and the stewardess would walk down the aisle taking $10 bills from every that's incredible. But I remember what made me think of it was I remember working the Renaissance fair in northern California and coming down with some friends who were going to get on the midnight flyer to LA. And they said, are you going to go? And I said, well, I'm not sure. $10 is a lot of money. I said, I'll do some shows in the airport, and if I make enough money, I'll go. So right in the middle of SFO, I just started doing some. And sure enough, a couple passes, the hat, I had $10. I said, okay.

R. Scott Edwards: 40:28

Oh, that's funny. Well, ladies and gentlemen, I hope you enjoyed number two in our series. We still haven't gotten to how Larry got his career going, but stay tuned. Hey, thanks for listening. Thanks, Larry.

Larry Wilson: 40:41

My pleasure.

Announcer: 40:42

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