Master juggler Mark Nizer shows Dover fourth dimension
By Andre Lamar @ The Dover Post

Juggling a couple of balls is one thing. But juggling lasers is a whole different ball game.

Mark Nizer turns the sport of juggling on its head with a show that mixes in lots of technology and humor. Imagine wearing 3-D glasses while seeing four lasers juggled at 1,000 RPM.

Since winning the International Juggling Championships in 1990, Nizer has taken his one-man show to thousands of venues, catering to kids and adults. His accolades include opening for entertainers Jerry Seinfeld, Bob Hope and Gladys Knight.
The world-class juggler will try to mesmerize Dover with his program "Mark Nizer 4-D: Expect the Impossible" at the Schwartz Center for the Arts on Friday.

Q What will audiences experience?
"Expect the Impossible," first of all, is the idea that what I do and what I've tried to do in my life is learn things that people would say you could never do until you've put in impossible time. So there's a trick I do in the show called the Impossible Trick that I've practiced for seven years before I got it once in practice.

Q What's the Impossible Trick and how did the idea come about?
You take a large playground ball and spin it on your finger. You take another volleyball and throw it on to your right foot. You throw the volleyball to your forehead. Then you roll it over your head to your neck. Then you roll the volleyball down your back, kick it with your heel and that ball comes up over the top of your head and lands on top of the playground ball and they spin together. My mentor, his name was Francis Brunn, performed that trick. I said I was going to learn it, no matter how long it took. He passed away; gosh, it's been five years now. He was in his 80s, but he was still performing that trick. I learned it as a tribute to him and to show people that anything is possible if you practice enough.

Q What do audiences see when they wear 3-D glasses at the show?
With my show you're watching me and I'm already three dimensional, because I'm a human in real space. But the fourth dimension is I have glasses that separate color. So if I was juggling red balls in a green robot suit with a blue background, the red balls come about 20 feet forward than where they really are. The green suit floats in the center. And the blue goes much farther back than where it really is. It creates this mind blowing, weird kind of world that people have never seen before.

Q You opened for Jerry Seinfeld. What was it like?
It was the very first performance he did after his sitcom ended. I was at the Hermosa Beach Comedy and Magic Club in Hermosa Beach, Calif. It was so funny. Here he is, sitting in the green room, nervous – like a little kid. He's got his notepad out and he's going through everything. It was so fun to watch and he just killed.

Q Did you get a chance to speak with him?
Yeah, we were hanging out in the green room. He was mostly asking me if this was going to work or if that was going to work.

IF YOU GO
WHAT "Mark Nizer 4-D: Expect the Impossible"
WHEN 7 p.m., Friday
WHERE Schwartz Center for the Arts, 226 S. State St., Dover
COST $14 to $28
INFO Visit schwartzcenter.com or call 678-5152

     

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