Tuesday night, one of David Letterman's guests is a gent named Ray Wold, who bills himself as a "pyrotechnician." This is a fancy term meaning that he sets himself on fire.
I first saw Ray Wold around 1993 when he was in a revue called "Hot Stuff" that played at the Sands Hotel in Las Vegas. I love variety acts — jugglers, magicians, folks who balance items and on each other, etc. Once in a while, those acts involve apparent danger to the performer and there's a certain fun in that because you know it's an act; that the performer has done it hundreds, maybe thousands of times, and that they're not likely to get hurt the evening you're there.
For example, at one point there were at least three magicians just in Vegas doing the "Houdini Water Torture" trick. That's the one where the magician is shackled and submerged in H2O, and the idea is that he has to get out in under three minutes because that's how long he can hold his breath. As traditionally performed, an assistant stands by with an ax to smash the tank and rescue the magician, just in case something goes wrong…and then something seems to go wrong. The clock ticks past three minutes without the magician emerging and his aides start to panic. Finally, someone yells, "Quick! Get him out!" and the guy with the ax rushes up and is just about to use it when the magician suddenly appears, dripping but alive, from some unexpected entry point. When performed with a little showmanship, it can be highly effective, even unsettling an audience that knows darn well that everyone is just pretending. The magician's life was not really in jeopardy, just as it will not be in jeopardy when the exact same thing happens at the 10:00 show later that evening.
That's how it works with most "dangerous" acts. I guess it works that way with Ray Wold, but it sure didn't seem that way.
I went to see "Hot Stuff" on the recommendation of a friend in another show. She said, "You like to see sexy dancers? Well, Anita Mann choreographed this new show over at the Sands." Anita Mann was and presumably still is one of the best choreographers in the business. She did Solid Gold, for instance, and the dancers in "Hot Stuff" were in that category. My friend further explained, "The show is not topless so they were able to get real dancers, and real good-looking dancers. Trust me. These ladies are sexier with their tops on than most Vegas dancers are with their tops off." That turned out to be a fair assessment.
But my recollection of the show was and is largely negative because of Ray Wold's spot. He came out with his hat and jacket on fire and throughout his time on stage, some part of him would always be engulfed in flames. He'd put one blaze out and another would start. Thanks to some combination of well-concealed insulation and clever manipulation, he seemed unharmed, even when he sat on a chair that was completely ablaze and sang a few bars of "Great Balls of Fire." At one point, he jumped rope with a rope that had been doused in fuel and set ablaze.
Entertaining? Not to me. Since he still seems to work regularly, I guess he's refined his act and found folks who enjoy it. But that night at the Sands, I have never seen an audience so unentertained and uncomfortable, especially those seated in the front row. Perhaps the act works better in a bigger room. The Sands had a tiny stage and when he was skipping rope, sparks and little pieces of burning something-or-other were flying around and some people got up and moved back. If I'd been sitting that close, I think I would have, too. He got some applause for his obvious courage and there was a big ovation at the end, which struck me (seriously) as audience delight that he had finished. A few people did walk out, never to return.
On the way out, I asked one of the Sands hosts if the fire act usually went over as poorly as it did that night. The man shook his head and said, "The show is called 'Hot Stuff' so I guess they figured they needed something like that. Every show, I worry." I'm not sure if he was worried about some high roller getting singed or about anyone in the place being burned. Either way, Wold had managed to convince even someone who saw the show at every performance that disaster was possible. I left, assuming that I would someday read either that he'd set a showroom on fire or that a member of his audience had been injured.
To the best of my knowledge, that has never happened so perhaps Mr. Wold is much more skilled than I thought, or maybe he's toned down what he does on stage. As I said, Letterman's having him on this week and I'm guessing Wold is the guy who occasionally appears on the program as "Man-on-Fire," just running across the stage with his back ablaze. (Paul Shaffer usually plays the old Arthur Brown song, "Fire," and probably will again, this time.) I can understand the entertainment appeal of a lot of things that don't amuse me personally, but I'm afraid this one just leaves me — the pun is unavoidable — cold.