We caught up with the brilliant and insightful The Magic of Elizabeth & Eric a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Elizabeth & Eric, we’re thrilled to have you sharing your thoughts and lessons with our community. So, for folks who are at a stage in their life or career where they are trying to be more resilient, can you share where you get your resilience from?
Elizabeth and I (Eric) have parents who grew up dirt poor, and had to endure so much hardship in their lives that it has given us great perspective. The fact that we are magicians, professionally, is a testament to the sacrifices they made and the love and support they gave us. Elizabeth’s mom immigrated to the United States from Honduras, leaving her first child there and going back for them when it was possible. For me, my dad grew up on the south side of Chicago, raised by his mom who immigrated here from Russia. Our parents crossed borders, fought racial/religious discrimination, and transcended poverty. We are eternally grateful and try to give back to this world by providing our audiences a magical escape from the every day. Being a gig worker has had its own trials and tribulations, but we make it work, and have been thoroughly enjoying the experience so far. It’s been the adventure of our lives!
Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?
Elizabeth and I (Eric) are married magicians. We took on the name “The Cosmic Romantics” a few years ago, because we both try to spot the little coincidences/special moments in life that could be easily missed, but have great meaning. Our performances are a series of those special moments that at least appear to defy all logical explanation. When we met several years ago in the LA magic scene, it felt cosmic.
Together we perform a vaudeville-inspired combination of illusion, song, comedy, and juggling, blended elegantly and performed at the highest level. Our bizarre mix of skills have allowed us to perform at all sorts of venues, like the Comedy Store, UCB, and House of Blues, for corporations like Google, the NFL, and U.S. Bank, and on major networks like Netflix, The CW, and Disney Channel.
Our biggest career moment so far was fooling our childhood heroes on the season 10 premiere of Penn & Teller: Fool Us. We’ll be back on this season and can’t wait for the world to see the stunt we pulled! We’re also working on a longer mentalism show called MindMeld that will be premiering in Chicago soon.
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
There’s a great entry in Steve Martin’s book, “Born Standing Up,” where he says that as an entertainer you will use everything you know. In his case, that meant incorporating magic, juggling, and banjo playing in with the comedy. We feel the same way. Elizabeth was a professional singer in the Long Beach music scene for years, and has incorporated her incredible singing voice (along with a bit of ventriloquism and vocal trumpeting) as well as her skills with a ukulele, very smoothly into our performances. Eric’s background in the Chicago sketch comedy scene as well as his juggling bravado (balls, devil sticks, cigar boxes, you name it) have also made their way into performances, making for a really well-rounded variety show experience. While our hearts are with magic, we sometimes provide that extra bit of wow factor that audiences didn’t even realize they craved until they see it live.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.thecosmicromantics.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thecosmicromantics/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@thecosmicromantics
Image Credits
Scot Nery & Kalie Pontes
