Anthony Cools brings his extreme, uncensored hypnotist show to the small showroom at the Paris Las Vegas. It follows a typical format of a hypnosis show, but it truly is far more extreme than any of the other shows of that ilk in town. The things that he gets people to do are completely outrageous. His patter and delivery is slick and well rehearsed, and the show runs exceedingly smoothly.

I have to give a bit of a disclaimer with which to begin...I hate hypnotist shows. I don’t like it when the audience is the entertainment. I don’t care for the puppet/master relationship that is set up with these types of shows, and I hate it when audience members are set up to be embarrassed.

With that said, and in contradiction to all of these precepts, I laughed uncontrollably---even when it felt totally wrong, I still laughed. The volunteers are there of their own volition, and they are willing participants. So with a caveat emptor in mind, I eased up on some of my notions and enjoyed the show.

Cools, a Canadian-born showman whose adult-themed performances have made him a hot nightclub attraction in cities across America. Cools has earned cult-like popularity through his ability to hypnotically persuade audience volunteers to behave outrageously on stage. His subjects eagerly obey his suggestions to play imaginary musical instruments, to engage in dialogue with their own body parts or to make passionate love to furniture. Every show is unique because Cools is never sure what kind of hidden personalities he will extract from the nightly group of amateur performers.

Cools' has had a lifelong fascination with hypnosis. In college, he was a television and film major. In his early years he worked as a radio disk jockey and a nightclub manager. He dedicated himself to the study of hypnosis and eventually developed the expertise to help thousands of people overcome behavioral problems. Through videotapes and private sessions he has helped his clients lose weight, stop smoking and overcome life-crippling phobias. In 1994, he became a comedy hypnotist as an experiment to increase business in his own nightclub. His show life quickly out-paced his clinical life.

Cools' does his best to keep the ribald and risqué activities from straying into an X-rated zone, but it is certainly a judgment call as to which side of the fence upon which he lands. He says that his subjects are rarely embarrassed, but I would have to have more proof to believe it. All I know is that I’m glad that I didn’t volunteer.

The space that he performs in is a make shift space that serves the needs of the production, but not much else. The production is funny---for all the wronging reasons, mind you, but it was very, very funny.

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