Hypnosis, and the Business of Show Business with Dave Curran

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Hypnosis, Business, and Producing shows

Dave Curran is a Ontario based Hypnotist known for his Las Vegas-like shows. He’s a friend of Jonah’s (who’s seen his shows over 200 times). Dave was horrible with magic at first, but after buying and practising magic-shop tricks at the age of 11, he begun doing close-up and walk-around shows. He then took improv lessons and, after seeing Terry Stokes live, decided to pursue Hypnosis.

After carrying tricks with him and performing for his friends at bars, he built a network of bar-owners to quickly start doing shows for free. This then enabled him to start betting on himself and take risks with snap decisions, for quick results. Also, this introduced him into the world of production, as he taught himself tasks that would be typically hired to save on costs and time. One of the secrets to successful live shows is making it seem like each performance is special and unique  to that night.

Dave learned from watching live acts that the beauty in scripted performance is that he can let his mind wander, and still carry on with the show. He learnt a lot about promotion and what not to do when advertising a show, no matter the size of venue.

One of his most popular shows was based around a male strip group, and after seeing the popularity of similar shows, he produced this until it became so popular that it ran for 3-4 years. With this, Dave shares how to get into a good production mindset, taking educated risks and scaling prices to popularity. He does a lot of 4-wall shows  and has enough of an education in watching the scene to know how to produce all shows from comedy to magic.

How to go about 4-walling, how do you go about selling a show?

“The best markets are small towns, near to bigger cities to sell more and have lower costs”

What do you want to tell the audience?

“Stop carrying a deck of cards with you everywhere you go”

What do you want to ask the audience?

“Do you believe in hypnosis? And is it real?”

Who would you recommend we get on the podcast next?

Shoot for the stars, David Copperfield

Plugs:
Watch him ay Dave & Busters (Oakville) every Saturday night
Website: https://davecurranlive.com/
Instagram and Twitter: @HypnotistDave