How Calgary magician Atsushi Ono wowed his method to the season finale of Canada's Received Expertise

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Atsushi Ono had a sensible concern when he realized he’d been chosen for a televised audition for Canada’s Received Expertise.
In spite of everything, he was not your common starry-eyed rookie in search of his first massive break. Prior to now 15 years, the Japanese-born magician has constructed up a strong profession doing company and personal occasions in Calgary, specializing in sleight-of-hand and misdirection. If the audition went unhealthy and the truth TV present’s judges – which embody Howie Mandel, Lilly Singh, Trish Stratus and Kardinal Offishall – determined to eradicate Ono on stay TV, it might need lasting ramifications.

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“My nervousness in the end got here from the sensation that I may be destroying my profession,” says Ono, in a Zoom interview with Postmedia. “I would destroy the boldness that I constructed over time by being a company entertainer. I’ve my repute amongst my purchasers within the Calgary space. I assumed I would destroy every little thing I constructed for a two-minute efficiency in entrance of judges if I bought buzzed out.”

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Ono had little to fret about, because it seems. Canada’s Received Expertise viewers watched the magician carry out a sleight-of-hand coin trick on the decide’s desk in the course of the season opener on March 21, which sufficiently “freaked out” Offishall a lot that he stood up and backed away from the desk. Ono, who added sharp humour and a few heady philosophical pontificating to the phantasm, bought the nod of approval from all 4 judges and would ultimately transfer onto the semi-finals. He carried out a extra difficult card trick, with extra decide participation, in the course of the semi-finals on Might 2. He was among the many first two acts, the opposite being Quebec dance troupe Conversion, chosen by the judges to compete within the stay, two-hour finale on Might 16.

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Ono is amongst eight acts chosen, both by the judges or viewer voting, to compete on Might 16. Amongst others, his competitors will embody Quebec “noise-maker” Genevieve Cote, Quebec dance crew The Solid, Nova Scotia’s singing twins The Turnbull Brothers and Edmonton dancers Cool Giraffes.

Born in Kyoto, Japan, Ono’s discovery of magic got here on the comparatively late age of twenty-two. He had travelled to Seattle to proceed his research in enterprise and advertising when he determined to hitch a gaggle of magicians who met on the Pike Place Market each Saturday. Initially, he thought it could assist him sharpen his English-language abilities.

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“I didn’t know something about magic at the moment,” he says. “I simply went there as a result of it sounded so attention-grabbing. Similar to each different individual, I appreciated to observe a magic present each every now and then however nothing greater than that.”

Nonetheless, he was taken below the wing of Tobias Pashia, a Seattle-based magician who grew to become Ono’s mentor.

“He was smoking a cigarette and he threw it on the bottom and extinguished it together with his foot and when he lifted it up there was a cigarette and after I appeared up at his face there was a cigarette between his lips,” Ono says. “It was so completely different than the magic methods I had seen earlier than that second. To me, magic was extra like a puzzle. His magic could be very visible and extra what we name misdirection. At that second I bought hooked on the thought of that particular kind of magic, the misdirection.”

Ono returned to Japan and commenced his magic profession in his dwelling nation in 2005. His brother-in-law got here to Calgary to check English and advised Ono that it had a booming oil-and-gas company tradition that would result in numerous work for a magician at non-public occasions. Ono and his spouse arrived in Calgary in 2008 and he spent 15 years working as an expert magician. Ono had utilized to seem on America’s Received Expertise however didn’t obtain any response. Canada’s Received Expertise was revived in 2022 after a decade-long hiatus by CityTV. Ono and his spouse not too long ago moved again to Kyoto, however Ono says that the transfer might be momentary. Whereas he not lives right here, Ona says he nonetheless seems like he’s representing town the place he developed lots of his abilities as a working magician.

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For now, he’s in Niagara Falls, Ont., which is the place the two-hour stay finale of Canada’s Received Expertise might be filmed on Might 16. Ono, who showcased some real nervousness throughout his preliminary audition, appeared to legitimately wow the judges, significantly Offishall. The hip-hop artist appeared too enamoured with what he was seeing to sit down nonetheless.

“I assumed I used to be very fortunate,” he says. “The great thing about close-up magic is that you simply by no means know what will occur. Once I noticed him (strolling away), I assumed I could make this funnier. The opposite factor was that I belief all of the judges. They’re the actual stars … they perceive how TV works. So no matter occurs, I’m going to belief them. They will make me even funnier or make me cool or no matter.”

Nonetheless, he admits he’s coping with some nerves main as much as the all-important finale.

“I don’t wish to disappoint anyone,” he says. “On the identical time, after all, I’m nervous as a result of it’s a stay present.”

Canada’s Received Expertise finale will air Might 16 on Citytv. Followers can vote for his or her favourites beginning at 6 p.m. MT by visiting Citytv.com/vote. The winner might be introduced over the last 5 minutes of the present.