We sat down with Christopher Howell and Desireé Kongerød , London magic and variety duo otherwise known as " Norvil & Josephine ". Christopher says he was ' transplanted ' to London from the US as a teenager when his family moved there . Desireé came to London from Norway to train as a dancer . Both of them have long since settled in the UK . They ' ve been performing together since 2006 for corporate events , theatres , festivals and variety shows . But they have only recently started a whole new adventure with a new touring comedy musical magic show . The show is called RABBITS OUT OF THE HAT and it blends their skills in magic and acrobatics with musical theatre style storytelling . It grew out of down time during the pandemic . They applied to Arts Council England to see if they could get some seed funding to start work on a show . They did , and then a year after that they applied again to develop it further . To date , they ' ve been working on it for three years now with a creative team covering everything from magic , acting and clowning , to singing , tap dance and even cape twirling !

Photo by Eric Richmond

VANISH - WHAT WAS THE IDEA BEHIND THIS THEATRE MAGIC SHOW ?

Christopher : I ’ ve always loved magic that tells a story . You have to find your own ways of making it work and do it in a context where people want to listen , but when it works it can be incredibly powerful . I like how it engages the imagination so much more than a magician simply displaying their ability to do something impossible . A story , or at least some simple

26 JUNE | 2024