Theater Reviews

Oct 27, 2004 - Kalin and Jinger's "Ghosts" at the Magic Underground is a funtime Halloween boo!

By Jack Neal

It was a dark and stormy night!

Mark Kalin and Jinger Leigh's "Ghosts," at Reno's downtown Magic Underground, is campy and scary and a "boo"tiful show for kids.

Kids, especially, will like it because it has the dark and spooky Halloween look kids love to hate. It's a trip of a trip down steep stairs into a dungeon, past an open casket holding a partially decomposed body, through a long hallway past some shady characters and into the Magic Underground Theatre itself where dark and stormy things happen.

The show's length isn't bad either - a nice slice of horror filled with fiendish laughs in a little less than forty-five spooky minutes. And it's not just suitable for children. It's fun for everyone.

Kalin is a first-class magician and he works some of his traditional wonders in this abbreviated show with the suave persona that's his trademark. Jinger is a glamorous dancer and the perfect foil for the smooth magic that permeates this underground chamber of old black magic. She has a dry and droll sense of humor and delivery and moves with a feline quality that's "purr"fection.

There's lots of audience participation in this short show; a man who helps Kalin levitate Jinger in a jungle of hooded, torch carrying macabre spirits; a girl cut in half and miraculously rejoined; an unfortunate who is smunched into flatness then magically reconstituted.

The finale is a swirl of color and camp that sports a triumphant bunch of monsters who bring a "there's no business like showbusiness" razzmatazz to the proceedings that's a treat, not a trick. And that's it; a skin and bones Halloween adventure that's ghoulishly easy to recommend.

The Magic Underground is a lavishly draped little theater worthy of Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber's "The Phantom of the Opera." Which could open the door for a collaborative magic show with book and music that might sustain this attractive space and these talented people with a sinister hit a la Hitchcock the public will support for an extended period of time.

Think of it! A "Psycho" with words, music and magic right here in the World's Biggest Little City.

"Ghosts" can be seen at 6, 7:30 and 9 p.m. Oct. 21-23 and 26-31, 2004, at the Magic Underground in the Pioneer Center, 100 S. Virginia Street, Reno, Nevada. For information call 775-324-6007.