FINAL PERFORMANCE LAST NIGHT

Southland Times, Issue 23740, 11 February 1939, Page 8

FINAL PERFORMANCE LAST NIGHT

NICOLA IN GORE TONIGHT The Great Nicola gave his last performance in Invercargill last night. He will appear in Gore tonight with his company of entertainers. The programme presented was a long one, and held the interest of the audience from start to finish. Nicola was on the stage for most of the time, the- main interlude being provided by Al de Clercq (“the Hollywood Hill-Billy”), who presented an amusing item of patter and finished with a tap dance. Nicola went from illusion to illusion with baffling speed. His mysteries are real mysteries, and still remain his close secret. Nicola performs all the more usual feats that have come to be expected of all stage magicians as sidelines while he talks. He pulls rabbits and fowls out of hats, billiard balls out of his ears, and makes cloths change colour in the accepted style. But his bigger acts are what matter. The Egyptian cabinet mystery and the trunk mystery, in which he binds a girl in a sack, places her in a bound trunk and changes place with her all in three seconds, are things that any audience will remember. The Iron Maiden is also presented and will leave audiences guessing and gasping.