Adelaide Parallax
Charlie disappeared and we had to decide—
—Were we going to continue on with a new act, or give up magic.
That was never a decision. We don't know how to do anything else, not anything interesting.
Professional stage illusions are fun and profitable.
If you put in the work. Don't just let people think this shit is easy, Cora. They have no idea...
Of course they have no idea, Callista. That's why they're secrets. And you know the old saying: a magician never reveals their secrets.
Except for when they do.
Man, f'ck that guy and his TV show! Sometimes it's about the flawless execution of the traditional illusions, the crowd-pleasers that everyone loves to see. Like when your favorite band is touring and plays your favorite song, even though it's from the first album...
We're getting away from the point. With Charlie gone, we had to build our own career path. Should we stay in the region?
Tour around from Indy to Chicago to Detroit to Columbus to Louisville—
Street magic our way to a theater show on Broadway or a streaming special in Hollywood?
Better than the Midwest but nobody's dream life.
At least not our dream. If an industry is going to take advantage of us, we want to milk it for as much as we can in return.
That gave us one option: residency at a major resort in a destination location. And while many cities claim that they are 'entertainment destinations', in our circumstance there was only one choice.
Like I said earlier, securing a Las Vegas residency isn't easy. Sure, we'd spent years developing our craft, but all of our show was centered around Charlie. We needed to learn some new key skills.
Patter.
And we needed to come up with new illusions.
But we come pre-built with a talent that gave us a head start. Being so identical as twins—
—Thanks for nothing, Mom and Dad—
—We just needed to design illusions to take advantage of that. If you can't perform the tricks that everyone wants to see, then you gotta perform the tricks that no one else can do.
The most obvious premise was to have one magician, one stage persona, doing even more impossible and incredible things. On top of that, we would have to precisely manage of our private lives. Nothing impossible. Not even really unusual. But necessary if we were going to keep the secret to our illusions—our twinness—a secret.
We started brainstorming names.
Uncle Erik had a good friend in the business, a woman named Adelaide Herrmann, the "Queen of Magic."
I learned about her when we were kids. Uncle Erik had a real passion for going around and debunking frauds, but he never said a bad word about Adelaide. Said she was a real pro.
They were so close, a theater fire destroyed her entire act — all of her props and stage animals — he and Aunt Bess supported her while she got back on her feet. She was the first woman to headline her own magic act. She performed internationally for decades.
It's a perfect name, traditional and exotic. Personal, familiar, and legendary.
And Parallax plays with the nature of illusion, of perspective, of the mis-match between what you observe and what your brain knows to be true. The world isn't moving outside the car window. But it looks that way.
Plus, it sounds nice. It's upscale. Modern. Billable. Adelaide Parallax at the Something Something Casino.
Dummy. They know it's the Black Box Casino.
Well, yeah. Now. But we didn't know it then. That's my point. Anyway, as easy as it was for us to come up with Adelaide, it took weeks for us to agree on Parallax.
Uh-huh, and why was that?
...Because I didn't know what it meant. Then. But now I do, and I love it, and that's what matters.
Mental characteristics
Personal history
Twins Callista and Coralie Weisz — descendants of the famous escape artist and stunt performer Erik Weisz, aka Harry Houdini — left home shortly after the disappearence of their brother, Charles Weisz. They toured the Midwest as part of a human only circus known as Schrodinger's Carnival of Mysteries.
Their family connection to Houdini coupled with Cora's freakish knowledge of old entertainments — Vaudeville, classic circus troupes, carnival acts and freaks, magicians and their fraudulent spiritualist cousins — drove the Carnival along the steady track to success.
It took three years of intense work to build their reputation as Adelaide Parallax, the Woman With Two Shadows. Another year brought the invitation to headline at Las Vegas destination famous for its magical entertainments — the Black Box Casino.
The Worldbuilder's Notes
At the Black Box Casino, everyone knows Adelaide Parallax. Now, if only she knew herself.
If "who is this character really" is the core dramatic question of every story, then that goes thrice for Adelaide. Exploring identity — especially fractured identities — is a key theme of this world and especially within Adelaide. She is both my protagonist and my primary perspective character...except for when she's not.
Because the story I'm telling explores who this character is, I don't want to expose all of her secrets here. Explaining the source of Adelaide Parallax as an act, and of the name itself, seems like an excellent compromise.
Because not only is she a celebrity headliner at the Black Box Casino, I also drop another layer of celebrity in with mentioning "Uncle Erik" (Harry Houdini was born Erik Weisz) and Adelaide Herrmann, real celebreties. They were contemporaries, colleagues, and friends.
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