Eric Chien was a magician act from Season 14 of America's Got Talent. He was eliminated in the Semifinals.
Background
Eric Chien is a Taiwanese magician, living in Houston, Texas. He won the FISM Close Up Grand Prix competition in July, 2018. After that, Eric went on to win the third season of Asia's Got Talent, which concluded on April 11, 2019. He is the first Taiwanese winner of the show, making him the first winner from outside Southeast Asia as well as the first winner from a country with no separate Got Talent franchise.
Eric was born in Taipei, Taiwan in 1993, and moved to America when he was 4. He was the only Asian in school. He was beaten up in school, so it was tough for him and had to transfer school four to five times. He started doing magic when he was 16 in high school, and he decided to be a magician since then. Magic helps him get through tough times. He loves to create his own trick rather than imitating what others did. [1]
After he posted a video of his magic routine on the Internet, a magician asked him if he would like to be a magic consultant, whose job is to create props and materials for magicians. As time went by, his urge of performing on stage instead of being backstage got stronger. At about 2016, he started making his own props. He started performing in front of big audience from about October of 2018, so he still feels nervous when having to perform in front of a huge crowd. He was called back to Taiwan for military service in 2015. He had to serve in the army for a year. During that time, he could't do any thing out of military duties, including magic. Therefore, he kind of lost his identity and had to find himself again after he came out. [2]
Eric is a friend of Will Tsai (Season 12 contestant) and Shin Lim (Season 13 and The Champions Season 1 Winner), and had met them a few times before in some kind of magicians event. He also had met with The Professional Regurgitator (Season 10 Finalist, The Champions Season 1 contestant), Steven Brundage (Season 11 Semifinalist), Eric Jones (Season 12 Semifinalist) and some other former AGT contestants before.
Audition
Eric Chien's Audition performance in Episode 1401 consisted of setting several items on a table including a white ribbon, two frames and a chest containing blue and red cards. He then placed sets of blue and red cards onto the frames and divided the table with the ribbon. He then proceeded to change the colors of the cards in various ways along with his vest also changing colors from black to blue and red. He also made several cards disappear and created the illusion of a card being cut up and then put back together with the ribbon. He transformed the cards into coins which he placed into the chest and the coins, along with the ribbon and frames, disappeared. Howie Mandel, Julianne Hough, Gabrielle Union, and Simon Cowell all voted "Yes," sending Eric to the Judge Cuts.
Judge Cuts
Eric Chien's Judge Cuts performance in Episode 1410 consisted of making coins disappear and reappear multiple times. In the beginning, he removed one coin from guest judge Jay Leno's firmly closed hand to his hand, then he created a coin from a drawn circle on a card. He did a coin routine including let coin disappear with just a pinch, grab coins out of thin air, and produce handful of coins out of nowhere. In the end, he put one of the coins he produced on Jay's hand and turned it back into ink. The coins, the pen, and the card on the table also turned into ink drawing. Howie Mandel, Gabrielle Union, Julianne Hough and Simon Cowell all gave him standing ovations. Eric's act was strong enough for the judges to send him to the Quarterfinals instead of Zack and Stan and SOS.
Quarterfinals
Eric Chien's Quarterfinals performance in Episode 1415 consisted of performing a magic trick with Julianne Hough involving candy and Rubik's cubes, by producing Rubik's cubes from chocolate candies, solving the cubes which he produced and mixed by Julianne, and turning them back into chocolate candies. Howie Mandel, Gabrielle Union and Simon Cowell all gave him standing ovations. Eric received enough votes to advance to the Semifinals in Episode 1416 along with Dom Chambers instead of Matthew Richardson.
Semifinals
Eric Chien's Semifinals performance in Episode 1417 consisted of making images of famous landmarks appear on blank cards. He placed the cards on a map of the world and turned them all into 3-D models. Eric did not receive enough votes to advance to the Finals in Episode 1418, eliminating him from the competition along with Ansley Burns instead of Benicio Bryant.
Trivia
Eric is the first act since Season 13 Quarterfinalist The Sacred Riana that has won Asia's got talent before, with The Sacred Riana winning Season 2 and Eric winning Season 3.
External Links
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