Magician Criss Angel was told that if he didn’t undergo shoulder surgery, he might be eventually forced to give up performing magic. He knew that he had no choice but to go under the knife.
But the expected 45-minute operation to repair torn muscles sustained in a New York City straitjacket stunt for his Spike series “Believe” eventually ran more than 3 hours. When surgeons opened up his right arm, they found his bicep hanging — torn from the shoulder.
Nobody believed that he’d be back onstage within a few months. He still doesn’t have clearance to resume the Cirque du Soleil show “Believe” at Luxor until hopefully sometime in April with its strenuous and dangerous illusions.
But Criss was determined not to let his theater staff, production crew and colleagues down, and although undergoing intense daily-rehabilitation workout sessions, he put together a new show, “Magic Jam,” at Luxor to keep everybody on the payroll.
He’s still under doctor’s orders to use extreme caution. His right arm is in a reinforced protective sling bolted to a waist strap. Under the skin, seven plastic screws — they will disintegrate after six months — hold everything in place.
The man who once jumped near the Grand Canyon on an exploding motorcycle and hung on fish hooks from a helicopter over Death Valley, Calif., now can’t even get a bear hug from family and friends.
“I have to be really careful. It’s frustrating. I could lift my arm before the surgery; now while it’s healing, I can’t. If I jump the wrong way, if I fall, I wreck it, and I would be finished,” he told me backstage recently.
But to keep his crew employed, he decided to risk the dangers, and everything he learned using his right arm he’s now doing on a limited basis with his left.
After two weeks of planning and rehearsing, he’s been able to unveil his dream show “Magic Jam” with fellow magicians and specialty acts, and incredibly after four days when I went to see him, he was up to 40 minutes of onstage hosting and illusions.
He introduced the comedy magic of his “Believe” protege Krystyn Lambert, who performed his straitjacket stunt; “America’s Got Talent” and former Flamingo headliner Nathan Burton; amazing mentalist Banacheck, who appeared on “Believe”; close-up card-shark Armando Vera from Mexico; Jason Byrne’s extraordinary and exotic birds that miraculously appear from nowhere; an adorable circus dog act; and funnyman Russ Merlin with his hilarious masked-audience participants.
“They are my unsung heroes, and it gives them their own starring platform,” said Criss. He’s tight-lipped about the future of “Magic Jam” after “Believe” returns but teases that he will be extending it in some format if he wins the expected blessing of Cirque and MGM Resorts.
So what is he up to? Read more here:
http://goo.gl/PrjsiJ
{ SOURCE: The Las Vegas Sun | http://goo.gl/PrjsiJ }
