By MAUREEN TOBIN & THOMAS YOUNG Special to the Daily Press
To this end we present a world of magic at Magicopolis in Santa Monica. Sit back and succumb to the magnetic pleasure of “Escape Reality,” a show of wonderful skits, theatrics, humor and great dialogue. ■ Magicopolis is the ultimate dream and creation of Steve Spill, an entrepreneur, magician, showman who has been around magic all of his life. Along with his wife Bozena Sparrow, a gorgeous, well-known actress in Poland, they produced “Escape Reality,” an extravaganza of pure entertainment. Steve with his dry, sardonic, droll humor and Bozena, with her sparkling, slightly madcap comic sense are show people first, effortless in their presentation. When Steve is performing, he is so dry that you sometimes forget he is “on.” Escape reality — something we should all do more often. Here is an exceptional diversion for all ages, with all of the cast pros. Come with your sweetie, your parents, your kids, yourself. Magic gives you a chance to open your eyes wide, be child-like in your curiosity and wonder. We sat close and kept asking, “How did they do that?” It all looked so easy. Steve and Bozena are such flawless performers.
Magicopolis opened in 1998 with Penn and Teller as the special guests, leaving their footprints in cement. This is a terrific theatre with every seat excellent, great acoustics, enchanting sets. There are two showrooms — the Abracadabra room with 150 seats, and 40 seats in their “slight-of-hand” more intimate theatre, the Hocus Pocus Room.
You can purchase magic tricks and other goodies. Birthday parties are a treat, where they bring about the day for you with food, cakes, magic class, bags of tricks for the guests and a big magic show. Shows are Fridays and Saturdays at 8 p.m., admission $25, Saturdays and Sunday matinees at 2 p.m. for $17.50. Web site: www.magicopo-lis.com. 1418 Fourth St., (310) 451-2241 ■ It’s Mardi Gras and the celebration is happening at Uncle Darrow’s Cajun Creole Eatery, in Marina del Rey, near Costco. The Uncle Darrow’s Family “prides itself on making the best quality gourmet foods, this side of the “Mason-Dixon Line.” Oooweee baby! This food is mouth-watering. Elmer Dills loves this place and it won “Best of LA” for Cajun Creole food from LAMagazine last year. Indigenous peoples from the South love it here, including actor John Laroquette.
Four cousins — Norwood Clark, Sam Small, Ronald Smith and Ronald Washington — own Uncle Darrow’s, all authentic home-grown gentlemen from Louisiana, and all chefs. They started this restaurant in Los Angeles in February 1994, and have been here for more than three years. Norwood Clark, the main host, is animated, smart, and full of joie de vivre. His family cooked for the famous Commander’s Palace in New Orleans for 27 years, so it stands to reason he would have inherited their fervor for designing exciting foods. These four men have a passion for their cooking and for crafting an excellent, pleasurable experience and adamantly feel if you walk in here a stranger you will walk out family. Don’t expect frou frous here. This is down-home Louisiana food at its finest with chicken, fish and shellfish on the menu. They don’t serve meat or pork, and guess what? You won’t even miss it. Special on Saturday and Sunday is the Crawfish Etouffee (crawfish stew) which was Maureen’s favorite, and the catfish, both raised in Louisiana. Of course, they make all of their own spices. If you are not used to these flavors, you may need a moment to acclimate yourself. Then watch out. The food was scrumptious and everyone was raving. Though stuffed to the gills, we shared their home-cooked peach cobbler. Whew, it was good.
Sunday, Feb. 29 from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m., is Mardi Gras here — Fat Sunday. In the parking lot the music will be wailing with blues, jazz and zydego bands on the stage, and crawfish and catfish will be flown in specially from Louisiana for this party of all parties. Of course, you can also go inside to get the usual excellent menu choices. We hear breakfast on weekends is just like being in the South and is a hot ticket. Uncle Darrow’s is all about bringing people together. Open every day, until 9 p.m. during the week, 10 p.m. on Friday and Saturday nights. Breakfast on Saturday and Sunday. Web site: www.uncledarrows.com. 2560 S. Lincoln Blvd. (310) 306-4862 ■ Here is a way for an entertaining, educational, fun evening any time. Stroll over to your favorite Borders or Barnes & Nobles bookstores. Naturally, you’ll want to browse. Of course, we wish you wonderful nightlife happenings. But we also desire that you bury yourselves in a good book occasionally. This should be one of your preferred pastimes. At many of these megastores, you can have coffees, meals and an assorted mix of events to woo you like book signings, music evenings, workshops, lectures, storytime. Almost always, these events are free. Take advantage. Check out their Web sites: www.borders-stores.com and www.barnesandnoble.com. (Please e-mail your comments or suggestions to, and keep having fun).
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on February 27, 2004. Read the original PDF.