Follow Your Myth

I have seen a fair number of magic shows in recent years, as my youngest son Asher has a keen interest in and talent for magic since he was around seven. This year he attended Tannen’s magic camp in person for the first time. If you don’t know what that is, it is the oldest magic camp that has been run by Tannen’s magic shop in NYC.  The camp is hosted at Bryn Mawr College for one week each summer.  Bryn Mawr lends to the camp the appropriate look that you might expect from a Harry Potter film, and people come from all around the country to attend and even compete.  In the past people such as David Blaine and David Copperfield have attended.

https://www.tannens.com/pages/magic-camp

Through the years we have gone to a lot of magic shows as a family, like some travel to see music venues.

We have gone to Vegas to see Penn and Teller, Shin Lim, and Colin Cloud.  We have seen Derren Brown perform on Broadway in NYC.  During the pandemic, we saw Justin Willman known for his series on Netflix, Magic for Humans.  We have been to see The Illusionists, a show that features magic and escape artists, more than once.  

The list goes on – and includes small local shows and big shows with magicians who draw thousands into crowded theaters.  We have been to see Colin Cloud so often each one of us has been chosen from the audience at random to participate in his show – and I don’t know why this happens since I try hard to communicate with my dead stare, “Don’t pick me”.

One of the most unique shows we have ever seen though we did not see in person unfortunately, it was on Hulu and is called, In and Of Itself.   

In and Of Itself, is a one-man performance by Derek DelGaudio, who also hails from Colorado where we live.

What’s remarkable about DelGaudio’s show is how subtle and poetic it often is.  The show is a psychological tour de force, wrapped in stories and one story in particular – that sets the frame, which I will not spoil.

DelGaudio uses the pretext of magic to tell us these biographical stories and engage the audience and the result is an emotional roller-coaster ride, that continuously draws the audience inward.   

IDENTIFY YOURSELF: I AM

Before DelGaudio’s magic show, he has his audience choose from thousands of identifiers on a wall. 

Each card begins, “I AM” and is followed by something like, “An Idiot” (which Stephen Colbert admitted to selecting when he attended the show).   Bill Gates chose “Leader.”  

Tim Gunn who can be seen in the audience has an authentic emotional reaction when DelGaudio tells him what he chose.  Gunn’s hand trembles, and his emotion quickens.

Why does this happen?  

What is it in this performance that evokes so many reactions from the audience?  Why might these emotional reactions ripple through the audience and even among us watching from home on our sofa?

Perhaps we react because we see something authentic on screen.  We react because as we identify with something, we are sometimes identifying with a narrative that we have accepted, such as when one audience member chooses, “nobody.”   There is loss felt in these moments, and within us the audience – we too feel that resonant feeling of when some negative identifier comes up if we have ever identified with a negative association.  

These feelings may haunt some of us and make us feel like a failure, or alone for instance.

We may react because we feel something stirring within us, and this is partly what I discuss as I discuss movies and television shows that may move us emotionally.  

When something resonates, it can pull something up from our depths that we may be stuffing down, and not be fully aware of. 

In this case it may simply be the struggle of trying to understand our place in the world.

MIRROR EMOTIONS

If Derek DelGaudio’s show does anything, the most magical thing it does is to connect with those stuffed and uncertain emotions.  It allows for that catharsis that I have spoken of previously. More so, there is something cathartic in group that is happening in DelGaudio’s show, that feels akin to group therapy.  It again gets back to the origin of theater, and how a show was performed that would move an audience and transport them.  Perhaps this is universal to humans, or even universal to conscious beings who feel a larger connection than to just themselves.

Emotionally, it is difficult to not become part of the show, because the authentic emotions that come up from Derek, and the audience alike – bring out those mirror emotions in ourselves. 

This show is an important exploration into what makes our identity.  It is an important reminder of the forces that can shape our lives in myriad ways.  I am not suggesting it is a replacement for therapy or group therapy.  I am recommending it like I recommend other media.  These things help us to explore who we are and help us to grapple with some of what we are working on, as surely as Shakespeare, or Sophocles added to our understanding of our shared human experience.  

Long before there was Freud or Jung, Carl Rogers or Abraham Maslow – performance explored and communicated the shared experience of humans.  

If you are trying to understand yourself, see if you can choose from the list at the beginning of the film… or at least having seen some of the choices decide on what you would choose had you attended in person.  Would I say, I am a Father? I am an Artist? I am a psychotherapist? 

What might I say on a bad day when I am feeling the wolves of depression nipping at my heels?

Consider the choice you make, and other choices you may have not made, or downplayed.   Then watch In and Of Itself and decide what it all means for yourself.