Penn & Teller – Fool Us

The airline magazine on the plane to Vegas had a coupon for 2 for 1 tickets to the Penn & Teller show in Vegas and we decided to give it a try– we were well pleased that we did. Later found you can also get a similar deal at most of the half price ticket booths around Las Vegas.
Penn & Teller produce an entertaining, fast moving show that is loaded with humor and mind blowing magic. Some is dramatic like the disappearing elephant and the bullet catch gun trick and others are downright poetic like Teller’s famous Shadows trick which is captivating and entertaining in a slow paced less hectic and dramatic fashion.
Penn’s positions on libertarianism, atheism and spiritualism are very forthcoming. For anyone who ever watched their TV series «Bullshit», this is a great venue and entertaining way to see the famous duo in person. Was very impressed to see them hang out in the lobby and share picture taking opportunities with fans.

This was my first time seeing Penn & Teller and I was left just a little underwhelmed to say the least.
The show started with Penn telling the audience that if they wanted to see how a particular trick was done that they would need to whip out their phones and use their cameras.
It was all kinda confusing to me and was not very clear to understand. Finally Teller went to an audience member that had a camera phone and she went up on stage and the magic trick started.
It would take too long to explain so in short I did not really care for the particular magic trick.
In a medium size nutshell the show itself seemed slow at times and kinda lost the crowd a bit.
Overall I enjoyed myself as much as I could with a few tricks that I thought were pretty impressive, but some tricks were just super boring.
I paid a total of $ 233 for 2 tickets with taxes and fees and I gotta say that it was definitely NOT worth the money. The most I would ever pay to see this show again would be $ 60 for two people… that is if I were to ever see it again, which I won’t.
So if your considering watching this show try to get the cheapest tickets you can find and know that if you want to be really entertained there are other shows on the strip that are way better.
Glad I had the experience, but won’t be trying this again.

This is an excellent show. The illusions they show are amazing, and while some are just variations of old classics, there are definitely a lot of surprises to be had. The theater is pretty big, so it might be better if you can afford not to sit in the nosebleeds. What’s amazing is how both Penn and Teller meet any fan that would like a photo or autograph after the show!!!

Funny and entertaining. This is a great family friendly show. Be prepared for a few tricks based on their political point of view. Penn and Teller heavily involve the audience. They also stay after the show to meet and greet everybody willing to wait. I’m not a huge magic fan but I did enjoy this show a lot.

Penn, you’re not going to hell for being an atheist… you’re headed there for taking money from college kids in the audience who like you’re sense of humor… you’re act is the worst I’ve seen in Vegas… and I’m a Senior citizen and have seen many. Rio you can do better. When’s their contract up?

What an amazing show. My wife and I saw Penn and Teller at the Rio in Las Vegas on Saturday August 22, 2015 and would gladly give their show two thumbs way up! Their art and craft of magic, comedy and narration (from Penn, but also from Teller) is first of all entertaining and enjoyable, but their show also challenges you to think about life and the world around you! These two are a class act and actually stayed to meet and greet people after the show. Furthermore they are also the only Vegas performers we have seen who thanked their entire crew, staff and behind the scenes people at the end of their show!

Great show! They show you some of their behind the scenes for magic tricks and the best part is they stay after the show and take photos and sign autographs!

Penn & Teller are 2 funny and fabulous magicians who have a great long running stage show at the Rio… so when I found out about free tickets to watch them tape their new CW network tv show Fool Us, at their Rio theatre… I was very excited about it.
This show has a history in England… where it was cancelled, and now they are bringing it (along with the funny British host, Jonathan Ross) to American audiences. The conceit of the show is that Penn and Teller have been around so long that they have seen it all, and other magicians come and do a trick and see if they can «fool» P & T to win a spot on their stage show. At the end of each show, Penn and Teller will do a trick of their own for the crowd.
On our taping there was some sort of technical issue with the rehearsals so we were kept outside the theatre standing single file in line for over an hour. Some drinks or snacks would have been nice… but whatever, it was free.
The theatre itself is beautiful and there weren’t any bad seats. It was very loose for a tv taping… audience members would get up and move around, play with their phones… very unusual from what I’d seen at other tapings. There is a warm up guy, but unfortunately he didn’t have much material other than «where are you from and what do you do».
The show itself is entertaining… the magicians did a great job and, apart from P&T themselves, nobody seemed to know how the tricks were done. It was also a very frustrating show, in that while the whole point of the show is solving the mystery of how things are done… and yet P&T speak only in code so the audience never finds out.
For example, a trick is performed and P & T deliberate to themselves while the host banters with the magician. Then, a few minutes later, Penn says to host host…“Jonathan, some day I will have to take you to lunch and explain how clever the magician was. Am I right?” While the host and audience are befuddled the magician says, «Yep, you got me!» and they move on to the next magician.
So it’s kind of like magician masturbation, where only the magician himself gets any enjoyment. Imagine watching Jeopardy and seeing Alex Trebeck say «The height of the tallest pyramid of Giza» the contestant buzzes in and says «What is, I would like to take you to lunch, Alex.» and Trebek says «I know what you are referring to…1000 points to you». That is not a show that would stay on the air for long… and I don’t think this one will either. Perhaps British audiences were more content with the clever code speak and not ever finding out the information… but then again they are happy to spend 2 hours watching a soccer match where nobody wins. Americans want results… we want to know what we are seeing. Still love Penn and Teller, but I don’t see this working.