College Times

He floated between two buildings, dead-lifted a taxi, walked down the side of the Aladdin Resort and Casino and was suspended by fishhooks, placed on his back, from a helicopter that flew 1,000 feet over the Valley of Fire. He has been buried alive, set on fire, blown up, hit by a car and struck by 3 million volts of lightening from a Tesla coil. And that was just the first two seasons.

Criss Angel is back for a third season of his show, “MindFreak,” which premiered June 5 on A&E with a record 2.7 million viewers who tuned in to watch Angel levitate 500 feet above Las Vegas in the light that emanates from the Luxor.

“It was one of the most amazing things I ever accomplished in my career,” the five-time Magician of the Year said.

But Angel’s career has been long and difficult at times – performing magic as a teenager at birthday parties and night clubs, and later mostly unsuccessful attempts to break into the music industry.

 “The incredible thing is that if you want success bad enough and … have days where you struggle to get through and pay your bills … when the day arrives that you have so many opportunities it’s really hard to say ‘no.’”

“The first season of ‘MindFreak,’ I would go out and risk my life and it would be a struggle to get 12-14 people to watch it. Now, I go out and eat an apple and 200 people are watching.”

“I have done over 900 effects in about two years, which is pretty insane and I believe that I am the best in the world at what I do,” Angel said.

Indeed, many of Angel’s some 200,000-plus Myspace friends and “loyals,” would say that illusionist David Blaine should bow to Angel.

Angel has made some not-so-subtle jabs at Blaine, and even tried to pose a challenge to him. “Every time we contacted his camp he always avoided me, for good reason because his biggest fear is me.”

For Angel, fear is not much of an issue; he doesn’t even fear death.

“It all stems from my greatest inspiration, my father, who got diagnosed with cancer and was given a death sentence of three weeks to live,” Angel said. “He was really a firm believer that the mind controlled the body.”

Despite his diagnosis Angel’s father lived for more than three years.

“Each and every moment of his life he had a smile on his face, he had such an incredible attitude and outlook and was not only an inspiration to myself, but to people he didn’t even know,” Angel said.

“When my father died in my arms, it had such a profound effect on me that at that very moment when my dad passed, I realized that I needed to face my own fears.”

It seems hard to believe that the man who was suspended by fish hooks was once afraid of needles.

“I used to pass out when I used to get blood taken at the doctor … the first thing I did was say I am going to confront the fear of needles.”

Angel also hopes to help other people confront their fears as well.

“One of the most gratifying things I get as an artist is when people watch me do these demonstrations and they in some way feel empowered by what I’m doing, so they confront their own fears,” Angel said.

There are people that think he actually has supernatural powers and others that think he utilizes camera trickery, but one thing is for sure, he has been able to create a provocative show.

Angel often says “what you see is what you get,” and notes that he will not do a demonstration unless he can perform it live.

Some of what he does is real and other things are illusions; he leaves it up to the audience to decide which is which, he said.

This season viewers will also see Angel make a Lamborghini vanish, get run over by a steam roller, walk on 12 18-inch screw drivers with bare feet, get dragged by a quad from his ankles and make Tai (an elephant he made vanish last season) reappear. “I got letters from kids … about how she was endangered … so I made her reappear.”

Prior to the premiere of season three, Angel performed an escape in which he was encased in cement in a cube less than four feet in diameter and hung about four stories above Times Square for 24-hours before the cube plummeted to the ground.

“It will be a challenge,” he said prior to the demonstration. “I have not rehearsed it … (or) seen it attempted by anybody, so it’s truly a challenge that I am very excited to face and I’m excited to have the public participate.”

The audience participated by helping pour the cement in the cube, which eventually contained 6,000 pounds worth.

In the end, the box dropped and Angel yelled to fans from the top of the scaffolding.

In order to prepare for a demonstration of this kind, Angel fasts and gets his mind focused, he said.

“It’s very much like how an athlete approaches a high-jump … they visualize in the mind what it is supposed to look like and you hope your body follows suit.”

For Angel, being methodical, prepared and remaining calm and collected is essential, he said. “I get myself in a meditative state and just get myself focused on the challenge.”

Angel has certainly been making his mark on pop-culture and has made magic exciting and fresh; none of that tired rabbit out of the hat crap.

“I think magic just doesn’t garner the respect it deserves, it’s kind of like a cheap, hokey novelty, and up to this point it was about shoving girls in leotards into boxes,” Angel said.  “I just think magic is so much more than that. It’s a beautiful art form that needs to be presented in a provocative, popular culture way.”

Angel has tried to accomplish this by making an appearance on the claymation parody “Celebrity Death Match,” as well as “CSI,” in which he played a killer named Luke Blade. That episode was number one in its time slot, beating “Lost,” he said.

Audiences will see Angel take on another character in an upcoming movie called “Mandrake.” 

“I have just signed on to do a movie called ‘Mandrake,’ which is based on the comic strip,” he said. In the comic strip, Mandrake is an illusionist known for his hypnosis techniques.

“I’m designing and creating the visual effect for that, as well as acting in it,” Angel said.

Angel also published his memoir, “MindFreak: Secret Revelations,” this year, which hit the Los Angeles Times bestseller list.

The man behind the “MindFreak” also teamed up with Cirque du Soleil and the Luxor to collaborate on a magic-themed show fronted by Angel; the 4,600-performance deal is slated to begin the summer of 2008.

While all of his projects are important, for Angel – much like Houdini – it is important to connect with the audience on an emotional level. “When you have that it is by far the truest form of magic,” he said.

Article Tools