Learn Ventriloquism with Steve Chaney

Running Time: 40 minutes

Retail Price: $24.99

Mike Maione: This tape is an okay "learn to" program. It gets the point across but it's not high on production value. That is, it does not take full advantage of the medium and is a bit boring...shot all in the same cluttered classroom setting. Wow...what it might have been, had it been shot in a studio of if Steve actually had someone else with him...who he was teaching, or if there were some good graphics to help illustrate where the tongue is placed in the mouth.

The quality of the video of Steve in performance is of really poor quality...but it serves the purpose of giving you an idea of how to perform with a puppet.

There is a section on how to make a puppet. Useful but disappointingly short.

When the entire program was over I felt like I wanted more...what's next? How about something on scripting. How to avoid the difficult words. Perhaps a list of alternatives to the 25 most frequently used words that are troublesome. Also a little booklet to accompany the tape would have been welcomed. In the end, you really only learn to substitute certain letters in the alphabet with other letters..."D" for "B" for example. It's a drag to have to go back to the tape to find out what I am supposed to do to make the "P" sound.

Still, I think you can learn the fundamentals and there aren't that many tapes on the subject out there.

Back to the M&M Magic Review © 1997