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Review of At The Table Live Lecture Series - Season One:

Five DVDs, 12 hours of lectures and $50 bucks. Is it gem or is it rubble? Stay tuned to find out.

Effect/Method

This is a lecture series packed full of tips, tricks, techniques, theory and more. You get five full lectures. Michael Ammar, Daniel Garcia, Jason England, Alex Pandrea and Jon Armstrong each deliver 2 plus hours of material.

These At The Table lectures are one of the best new things to hit the magic scene in a long time. You really do feel like you're at the lecture. Each lecturer made some mistakes in their performances (except for Ammar - as far as I could tell). Some of the mistakes were more obvious than others, but it didn't detract too much from the lecture. Each lecture covered a broad range of material and topics.

Ad Copy Integrity

To get more detail on the contents, take a look at the ad copy. It's accurate and briefly overviews the contents.

Product Quality

This is a Murphy's Magic Production and very well produced. They had multiple cameras and excellent close ups. The format is a little different. Rather than the lecturer getting up there and "doing his thing," there is a host sitting up there with the lecturer. At times it was more of an interview. Most of the time the concept worked well. But occasionally, I felt it got in the way of the performer.

The only other complaint I had was that there were a few effect by Garcia and Pandrea that were not taught because they're sold separately. Also, on the Armstrong lecture, they spent some time with his tiny plunger effect, but it felt like they were picking up in the middle of it, and a lot of the info/details seemed to be lost.

Again, nothing too dramatic, but enough to be a lit bit disappointing.

Final Thoughts

Overall, I think that this new concept will be a very important tool for future magicians. I think that now is a good time to make a change like this in the magic world. These lectures are solid and the kind of thing that new magicians need to experience. They're also excellent for experienced magicians. Topics like doing magic on TV are covered. The Ammar DVD alone is worth the price. But you get 5 for $50 bucks. At $10 bucks per DVD, for 12 hours of solid material, it's hard not to recommend this.

Final Verdict:
4.5 Stars with a Stone Status of Gem.