We're not especially impressed by card tricks, and most of us DFW.com'ers are a bit skeptical when it comes to magic. But we met a guy this week who's not only changing our minds. He's reading them.
We met mentalist Joe Riggs through the fine folks at the Longhorn Saloon in the Stockyards, where Riggs -- a newly minted Fort Worth transplant -- will be performing regularly on Sunday nights (showtimes are 7, 9 and 11 p.m.). On Thursday nights, you can also find Riggs at the Longhorn, but he's doing more crowd-mingling than full-on show material. (Note: for the time being, his shows are free)
Riggs describes his work as a blend of mentalism and magic -- which was evident by a handful of card tricks he showed off. But those weren't what really blew us away. No, as a handful of us sat in an intimate conference room, we were more impressed by these things: * While a pair of eyeglasses rested in our flat palms, Riggs made them flip over -- without touching them. * He told one of us to think of a person -- living or dead, fictional or not -- and the other to write down a place (with the same parameters). We were asked to write down our choices while he was either out of the room or had his back turned. And, long story short, damned if he didn't come up with Mark Twain and Big Ben (minor controversy over whether Big Ben is both a thing and a place, or just a thing, but Riggs still got it right). * Again, normally we wouldn't go gaga over some guy bending a spoon until it breaks in half, or twisting a fork's tines into some mutant-looking object. But when we tried to replicate any of these things, we found it impossible.
And that's only skimming the surface of about an hour-long presentation; Riggs, a charming performer, says he has about 14 hours worth of stuff.
So now we're mental for the mentalist, and can't wait to hit one of his shows.
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