Photo by Emily Filocco
The most recent installment of Tuesday Night Live, also known as TNL, featured magician Ran’D Shine, who was armed with illusions, card tricks and a variety of other gags in front of a lively Friends Hall audience.
Prior to Shine’s performance, junior Melissa Aiello took the stage with guitar in hand. Aiello began her set with a cover of “Pumped Up Kicks” by Foster the People and followed it up with a mash-up of summer hits “Cheerleader” by OMI and “Honey I’m Good” by Andy Grammer. Other covers that Aiello tackled were Beyoncé’s “Halo” and an a capella version of “Irreplaceable” that had the crowd clapping and singing along.
Shine began his show by explaining the relationship that playing cards have with time and space. He proved his theory by bringing up an audience member and continually presenting him with a four of hearts, which was representative of his specific birthday.
The enthusiastic Shine moved on from his warm-up and transitioned to a trick he picked up while travelling in South Africa. He took a seemingly empty pouch and tossed an invisible object into the air, which materialized into an egg. With the audience engaged and mystified, Shine brought up a student to be put into a “light hypnotic trance.” He used this opportunity to show off his sleight of hand abilities in a trick that fooled the participant on stage, but the truth behind it was obvious to the audience. The magician balanced comedy and magic throughout the performance with a great deal of audience participation.
His finale was an intricate trick that involved multiple participants. The trick had someone call a friend who wasn’t on campus and essentially figure out what random card they were thinking of to prove that the “impossible” was indeed possible. Shine also showed off his intuition by guessing a word on a random page in a book and correctly naming the person one student shared their first kiss with. Shine engaged with the audience throughout the performance, oftentimes taking a moment to make a joke or comment on something shouted from within the group of spectators.
The College Programming Board has continued its introduction of hypnotists, magicians and performers of the like that have consistently been engaging the student body. Many students were baffled by the deftness and accuracy of Shine’s magic tricks and openly shouted their praise from the first trick to the last in the set.
brocha@ramapo.edu
