Review: THE REMARKABLE BEN HART, Wilton’s Music Hall

Master of illusion, Ben Hart has created a theatrical experience which blurs the line between trickery and the inexplicable. The Remarkable Ben Hart is a show which feels as much a meditation on imagination and perception, as it is a showcase of pure magic.

From the moment the audience enters Wilton’s Music Hall, the atmosphere is thick with intrigue. The stage, bathed in sinister red lighting and layered across multiple levels, shrouded in smoke, sets a scene of otherworldly mystery. Hart builds his show around a selection of his favourite tricks, which highlight both his technical skill and his fascination with surrealism and the occult.

Early illusions include a hidden shot glass of whisky conjured from an empty bag and a painting palette where three audience members select colours, which brilliantly appear within furniture choices. These opening sequences establish his flair for misdirection, yet the evening shifts towards something deeper. The projected image of Salvador Dalí’s The Persistence of Memory becomes a springboard for Hart’s reflections on dreamscapes and the malleability of time, neatly echoing his illusions, which twist reality itself.

The tricks range from the uncanny to the playful. A set of forks bend impossibly into exaggerated shapes from within five sealed paper bags, elevated beyond a mere stunt with Hart’s description of it as “not a fork, a concept”. A levitating Ouija board session with two audience participants underscores his fascination with the occult, while smaller flourishes, such as rope knot unraveling, card revelations and a scrying mirror, retain an air of Victorian parlour charm. His comic timing is sharp, especially when teasing younger audience members with a witty comparison of DVDs to “Snapchat for Victorians”.

The evening’s most memorable sequence arrives when Hart declares he has “torn a hole in the fabric of reality”. A stage-spanning net is raised, and in a dazzling display bowls of rice become doubled and water appears magically, a feat met with audible gasps. His finale, a double card revelation from a black and red deck, culminated in a spinning coin which left the room questioning the very stability of reality.

Hart’s work is at its strongest when it transcends trickery to evoke wonder, offering more than astonishment, but an invitation to question perception itself. The production balances some smaller set pieces feeling like interludes rather than climaxes, yet the overall effect is both striking and memorable.

Wilton’s Music Hall proves a perfect venue, its atmosphere amplifying Hart’s fusion of the eerie and the elegant. This is not simply a magic show but a theatrical exploration of imagination, dreams and belief, performed with charisma and precision by a magician who continues to expand the boundaries of his craft.