El Mago Pop
8 / 10
If you can catch El Mago Pop during its too-brief run, you will be well entertained. Between his more spectacular setpieces, the winsome Diáz—a compact cutie who is billed as Spain’s top-selling artist of the past five years—proves his bona fides with dextrous ventures into card and ball manipulation. (Time-filling video sequences depict him in comic-book graphics, like a modern-day superhero.) A few of the tricks will be familiar to magic fans, but Diáz puta clever spins on some of the more familiar routines: a standard torn-newspaper bit is subsumed into a larger sequence that takes you aback, and a moment of quasi-levitation is berthed in elegant shadow play. Broadway hasn’t hosted a magic show since before the pandemic shutdown, and it’s good to have some illusions again. For 75 delightful minutes, you may feel a little transported yourself.
