Paul Daniels

PAUL Daniels is not merely one of the best illusionists of his generation, he is one of the most entertaining. He adds to his prestidigitational skills the warmth, the comedy and the patter of the Middlesbrough music hall from his north of England youth.

And this week's show in Dublin is a family show in more senses than one: it plays directly to a family audience and seems, for the most part, to be peopled by Mr Daniels's own family.

Neither the tricks nor the patter are exactly new, yet the former continue to surprise and the latter continues to charm.

Among the former are the famous ball and cup, varieties of card tricks, large and small, the solid steel rings which link and unlink, the cabinets in which pretty women, like Debbie McGee appear, disappear and reappear, and the banknote which, having had its corner torn off, eventually emerges from a walnut within an egg within a lemon.

And, conducted a mite laboriously by Martin Daniels, there is the old vaudeville joke of draining the contents of a milk can from a man's head down through his elbow.

Audience participation, on stage and off, is the order of the night and hilariously so on stage in the second half when the search is on for nearly 30 minutes to find the torn banknote.

It's not the glitziest show that Paul has presented but it is as nostalgically enjoyable as most of them. And he can hardly be touring live theatres for the sake of the money. As he makes clear without difficulty, he enjoys the stage and live audiences. That's why last night's audience enjoyed him too.