Hugo Cedar, if we are to believe the legend, was a magician who carried out the ‘perfect’ magic trick, after standing on London Bridge for over three hours, he simply vanished in front of the crowd who had assembled to watch, and was never seen or heard from again. The Vanishing Man, which has already had a successful run at The Vault Festival returns for Edinburgh audiences, along with a second show which plays immediately afterwards.
The production sees two theatre directors turn performer.  It seems natural really, given that it is a theatre directors job to create magic on stage, tricking audiences in to believing they are in another place or time, and forcing deliberate misdirection to create a specific effect. David Aula admits he can’t actually do any tricks, but he has been able to deconstruct and ‘solve’ every trick he’s seen – apart of course from Hugo Cedar’s final trick.
Combining close-up magic, mostly from Simon Evans, with a quite complex narrative makes for a fascinating watch, and the audience are most definitely kept on their toes. We are supposedly on the journey of the show’s conception, and how it got to be where it is today, through various preview performances where audience members like Jemima and Brian played crucial roles.
There are magic tricks performed, for some the method is revealed, others are left a mystery. But it is the narrative that makes this more than a magic show, the story of Hugo Cedar blending with another similar narrative from Simon and David. It is at times confusing, and at one point slightly deflating, only to be lifted again to the point of being compellingly poignant.
What The Vanishing Man is essentially trying to say is that we’ll believe most of what we are told or shown, and that misdirection, and the ‘self-deceiving’ audience member allows magicians to steal the audiences wonder. Simon and David demonstrate this in a myriad of ways, many of which we probably don’t even realise as we watch. Simon Evans’ strong delivery of the close-up tricks combined with an almost paradoxical narrative make this a show that isn’t just magic, but enchanting.
