This past weekend saw Gqeberha-born entertainers Brendon Peel and Li Lau do what hundreds of magicians could only dream of – they beat world-famous magician duo Penn and Teller at their own game.
In the hit US reality show, Penn & Teller: Fool Us, aspiring magicians from all over the world perform their best tricks to try and fool Penn and Teller. If the two cannot guess how the trick was done, the “fooler” gets to be on their Las Vegas magic show.
Peel and Lau’s success means it’s off to Las Vegas for the first African Duo to compete, let alone win. They will perform for a limited run alongside Penn and Teller in their hit long-running live show at The Rio Hotel and Casino.The pair are still reeling after their win, which aired in the USA over the weekend.
“I’m shocked to the point of speechlessness. I knew we had an amazing stunt and knew it would be a great one to perform on the Las Vegas stage, but we were in essence performing it before idols of ours and these guys have been in the business for decades; their accumulated magical knowledge is vast. So, to fool them came as a huge surprise and shock. I’m sure the expression on my face in the footage speaks volumes as to what I was feeling at the time when they told us we fooled them,” said Lau.
His sentiments are echoed by Johannesburg-based Peel; “It was surreal. To this day it genuinely still seems like a dream. My face in the video says it all.”
Audience members as well as the hosts shared in the pair’s awestruck moment as the duo managed to leave Penn and Teller bamboozled. This is quite a feat as the magician success rate on the show is said to only be 10-15%.
As long-time fans of the comedy magic duo Penn and Teller, Peel and Lau say that meeting them was almost as amazing as winning.
“Any magician in the world would have to perform on Penn and Teller Fool Us as a bucket list item. For us, it’s like the Oscars of magic.
“Both Penn and Teller were amazing to chat to and both have an undying passion for promoting the art of magic and illusion around the world. It was an honour and a privilege to meet them,” they said.
Peel and Lau have both garnered success as individual acts, Peel with mentalism and traditional magic and illusion whilst Lau largely does bizarre magic, escapes, and sideshow acts.
“We each have our different styles of magic, which is one of the reasons why our partnership works so well. We are different and offer different aspects of magic,” said Lau.
The pair met in 2015 and bonded around being to only two magic acts in Gqeberah at the time and have gone on to win various awards as a duo and have been contracted as magic and illusion consultants on a brand-new TV show on Amazon Prime called “In Your Dreams”.
The 2020 Standard Bank Ovation Award Winners for “Magic of Sideshow” have been featured on Britain’s Got Talent where they WOW-ed Simon Cowell and made it to the finals of Got Talent All Stars Global Edition.
Check out the video presentation to the Penn & Teller: Fool Us judges here: https://youtu.be/BuFGSMEft3o?si=6mZyh8TVry5uRUjD