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Strategies & Market Trends : Asia Forum -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: GUSTAVE JAEGER who wrote (9913)	7/4/2001 2:26:32 PM
From: Rolla Coasta	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 9980

Copperfield forced to duck trick after bird-flu crisis hongkong.scmp.com NEIL WESTERN David Copperfield: audience should just relax and enjoy the ride. Magician David Copperfield has fallen foul of the bird-flu crisis, having to cancel a trick in which he was to make a duck appear at his show's Hong Kong premiere tonight. Organisers said the month-long ban on live poultry imports, which ended a fortnight ago, made it impossible to stage the stunt, which has been a regular on the Asian tour of his Portal show. Dale Rennie, managing director of promoters AEC, revealed the hitch yesterday. Copperfield's show runs until Friday at the Hong Kong Coliseum in Hunghom. "The process with using live animals involves getting two licences from the Agricultural and Fisheries Department, one to allow a duck in a public place, the second for it to perform on stage," he said. "The bird has to be weighed and medically certified that it is in good health. But the ban on live fowl during the bird-flu crisis meant we simply couldn't get it done in time." Mr Rennie said the Government had been "sympathetic and very helpful" and even said it could issue a special licence for ducks to be flown in from Singapore and then re-exported, but Singapore authorities said they would refuse to take them back. "The duck trick is one of the humorous moments. We've never had a problem before. It's taken more effort trying to get the duck on stage than bringing Copperfield and his entire entourage over from the United States," Mr Rennie said. Despite the duck trick's disappearance, Copperfield promised yesterday to keep his audience spellbound with his most famous feat - making audience members vanish from the theatre. "We are going to have a big illusion called a portal. It involves a crew on a beach, a secret beach right now. I'll take people and transfer them in a second, half way around the world," he said. Participants in the journey would be selected at random by throwing balls into the audience. Asked what people who took part in the illusion felt, Copperfield said: "I think it's pretty real. They were just very happy. They got the frequent flying miles without getting jet lag." In spite of repeated attempts to discover how the trick was performed, Copperfield said only he knew its secret. "Each of my own staff knows a fraction . . . but nobody knows the entire piece except me." He advised audience members not to wrack their brains trying to figure out how he does his tricks. "There are always people trying to work out how things are done. I think the best way to enjoy the experience is to relax and go with it, like watching a special movie," he said.