Tux-wearing Tyrone Reveen picks up at PNE where famous father left off
Credit to Author: Gordon McIntyre| Date: Sat, 17 Aug 2019 19:00:21 +0000
Impossible, you say? Nothing is impossible for The Impossibilist 2.0.
“This is an opportunity to implement some great special effects, some of which have never been seen before, that will blow people’s minds,” Ty Reveen said before beginning 15 nights of entertaining at the Pacific Coliseum during the PNE Fair.
“I do a few things in this show that will surprise even the people at the top levels of the magic industry.”
He’s followed in the footsteps of his famous father, who died in 2013, a couple of years after his son Ty took over the act.
Ty and his three brothers spent their early years in Chilliwack, West Vancouver and Richmond, their dad (yes he had a first name, Peter) having arrived in 1961 — “With literally five cents in his pocket,” Reveen le fils said.
The boys and their mother Coral later followed from their native Australia after the hypnotist had established himself.
The original Reveen broke records when he played a virtually sold-out Orpheum for six weeks straight in 1964, drawing 60,000 in total.
The father was famous in the United States and Great Britain, was a regular on the Las Vegas Strip and on The Merv Griffin Show, but it was in Canada where he was adored — on Granville Street, on Yonge Street in Toronto, Rue St. Denis in Montreal, on main streets throughout the country from the B.C. Interior to the Atlantic coast.
“My dad took hypnosis out of the back-alley nightclubs and brought it to the theatre,” Ty Reveen, relaxing backstage and wearing a tie with a top hat and rabbits for a pattern, said.
His dad caught the magic bug as a youngster and then began devouring books on hypnosis and the power of suggestion.
And, like his dad before him, Ty Reveen began practising magic tricks at five. That’s also the age at which his dad told Ty that he would one day be standing in his father’s shoes. And tux.
“After that I always imagined myself doing that,” he said.
It took a spell, so to speak. Ty Reeves, now 60, had a successful career creating special effects and magic tricks for the likes of ZZ Top, Michael Jackson, Alice Cooper, Earth Wind & Fire, Diana Ross and David Copperfield.
“I got my start from two people in the (special effects) industry,” he said. “One of them is David Copperfield. He was the first guy to really endorse my products. But (guitarist and lead singer) Billy Gibbons and ZZ Top were the first people to believe in me.”
There was that other calling, however, the destiny of being the next Reveen that put him on stage under the spotlight instead of in the shadows of the wings.
“As my father’s getting older, he’s kinda looking at me and thinking, ‘Y’know, time is ticking away son. You gonna do this, or what?’”
That was 10 years ago.
He’d spent much of his young life working his dad’s shows — “If you ever saw my dad perform, you would’ve seen me on stage” — but it took Ty Reveen a couple years to get up to speed, at least enough to satisfy his dad that the Reveen franchise was in good hands.
“He said, ‘If you’re going to take on my tuxedo, you’re going to have to learn the high-speed memory demonstration or you’re not going to be Reveen.’”
So Ty mastered the chess knight’s tour, a series of moves in which the knight lands on every square once and only once. “It’s the most complex memory demonstration, I think, anyone’s ever seen on stage.”
Reeves, who makes his home in New Brunswick, calls the PNE the best summer festival in Canada.
“I remember coming here as a child with my parents. I have the fondest recollections of the PNE as a spectator for years and was just thrilled at the opportunity to do 15 shows.”
He wasn’t about to give away any secrets or tip his hat about what audience members should expect, at least not before Saturday night’s opening show. But we do know this: There is a mock gravestone of his dad’s, whose ghost rises only to turn into … Tyrone Reeves!
After that, there’s 88 more minutes of show to go.
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