Magic of Polynesia

Going to this show was literally a shot in the dark. My group of friends and I literally mixed up some flyers and had a stranger pick one… ironically they picked the magic show. Everyone in the group even got an awesome volcano drink and had a great time. The show by itself was amazing and kept you intrigued. I’ll defiantly spread the word about this one!

The magic show was an awesome experience! Im so glad I had a chance to see it while in Hawaii. The floating Lamborghini was sick! All the magic acts were amazing. The waitress comes around often so I couldnt help but to get a few pina coladas. At the end of the show it started snowing indoors. Its a show you must see!

Entertaining to say the least. Good balance of native dance routines and magic. Fire spectacle was very entertaining. Dude has some good skills.

Came here with my husband because our Luau got cancelled due to rain. My husband had really wanted me to see a Polynesian dance so he booked the Magic of Polynesia from our hotel. The price came out to be about $ 100 a person with meal included. Dinner consisted of chicken and beef with mash potatoes and carrots and broccoli. Food was about 4 stars. They give you a huge portion of chicken and beef. I could not finish my beef and felt bad for throwing it out. The chicken was not bad. The show is great for kids because is a magic show and it was pretty entertaining where things disappeared and reappeared. He also got the audience involved which was fun for the crowd. I thought it was pretty good for a magic show and polynesia dance. If you have kids in the age group of 6 to 12 years old they may really like the show. I did not know this prior to the booking but you can also just book the show instead of booking the dinner and the show together. Overall, good show for a family event.

I would do 5 stars if I had only seen the show. The reason for the 4-​star is simply because we did the dinner show. The dinner was very un-​impressive. I would not recommend the dinner. The Teriyaki chicken was kind of dry and had skin on it, but it wasn’t crispy. The pot roast was kind of dry too. The mashed potatoes and the bread were good and the veggies (broccoli and carrots) were so-​so.
However, the show was fantastic. I would definitely recommend. It’s a relatively inexpensive show that gives you a taste of magic, comedy, and hula. There was a guy who did table side magic before the show, which was very fun to watch or participate in. There was some audience participation throughout the show but I found it to be «enough to be fun, but not so much that you feel like other people are having a full conversation» LOL. About 30 minutes of the show was Polynesian /​fire knife dancing also.

As a local and seasoned dancer in Hawai’i, this is NOT the show to go to! This review is going to be for the most recent show that I attended. Plain and simple… it was HORRIBLE! Keep in mind that I had visited the show about a year and a half prior to this visit without this much disappointment.
Let’s start off with the «upgrades» to décor that they did. I’m not sure how they did these upgrades while still preserving the dust from the past 15 years?!? Started sneezing as soon as I walked in. They force you to take pictures before going in… not even an option or else the Chinese picture taker will give you the meanest stink eye and call you a «f***ing a**hole».
Sat down for dinner and had a waiter who was probably stoned out of his mind and made a face like we were bothering him for some water. The only reason I say he was probably stoned out of his mind was because he smelled like weed. Food came. Food was ok…
Show starts and I was so excited for my favorite opening number but… they changed it! It used to be this really sexy, fiery number but is now a boring and very confusing water showgirl number (it looks like they have loofahs on their costumes?!) All of the magic is very similar to the last times I watched… but it is so lackluster and played out compared to when I first watched the show, 15 years ago. No big tricks. just a bunch of small audience magic and racist jokes. A few of the tricks need to be polished because I could see people getting in and out of trap doors and some of the tricks not working properly… to top it off, you could hear the sound guys yelling at people when they made mistakes! What a great way to keep the magic, magical!
As a dancer myself, I’m going to say that in the past, there were a select few dancers that stood out. I remember getting the names of my favorite dancers over the years: Lopaka, Jamie, Carissa, Alaana, Chase, Vili, Nalani, and at my last visit before this show, Kelsey. All of these dancers have moved on and now they’re left with a bunch of off-​time, poorly techniqued, and uncaptivating dancers. So sad to see the performance quality fall so much. There’s no mana. Costumes are poorly made (these must be new since I had never seen them before) and looked like they didn’t fit the dancers. New dances were so boring, it felt like a recital. Fireknife was still awesome!
At the end of the show, we left the showroom and walked past all of the dancers who looked angry or were talking amonst each other like we didn’t even matter. So much for hospitality! I overheard one of the female dancers talking about taking coke to get her through all of her jobs? What?!? No need to hear about your life story… just came to watch the show, thanks.
At the end of the day, this show is such an iconic piece of Waikiki history, but it’s hard to want to return after the experience I had. Hope this review helps the show to get better… maybe I’ll hear a good review from a friend and come back to visit, but in the mean time, I will spend my time at other local lu’au to get my money’s worth.

We came to late to eat dinner here but we did make it for the show. My two kids absolutely LOVED IT! My 3 year old went crazy for the fire show, the snow falling on us and the helicopter, house and lambo they made disappear. I’d you have kids, they will love this show!

Overall, I really liked this show. Although, I found it strange that its supposed to be a magic show, but half of the time they’re dancing hula, tahitian, doing fire dancing and more. I’m a local girl, I get enough of that already! Lol. I wanted to see more magic! I mean, I guess I get why they involve all the dances, it is Waikiki, plenty of tourists.
I believe it was $ 25 per person, and keiki 3 and under are free. Pictures are taken of your group before you enter to room. I don’t know how much the picture was, but we got one. Also, the show is about 1hr and 15 mins.
The atmosphere was really good. The servers were quick. I got there and I was hungry, so I thought the menu on the table was for food, but it was just a drink menu. The haole guy next to us said that if you wanted a meal with the show, that you had to pay extra ahead of time. That’s okay, I’d rather starve than pay big bucks for a manini plate, when I can go grind after, right? Lol. The drinks were super good though, pricey, but good. I got the strawberry cream smoothie. Super delicious, I wanted to get another. Haha.
What made the show really funny was the Japanese tourists that were pulled on stage, a couple. The lady was cooky, and stuck the finger! Haha. I just didn’t like how he made fun of the tourist, I felt bad. But overall, good time and fun for the kids! :)

Hmmm, I guess my favorite part was the fire dancing. The majority of the evening was dancing with a little magic thrown in, and no shortage of jokes between acts using the same people from a couple of tables near the stage. Couldn’t actually tell if the people involved were part of the act or not,. Which I guess is good.
If you don’t pay for the very expensive meat dinners (either chicken and rib for a fee, or steak and lobster, for double the price of your basic$ 60 ticket), your seats are in the very back. You would share a table with a large group so in that regard it makes sense to show up at check in, about half an hour before the show. But it’s not really the kind of show you need to be up close for.
The dancing is enjoyable, but a luau might be more fun for the price. $ 60/​person is a lot for what we got. Kids would get a kick I’m sure, but los of less expensive things will also entertain children.
They gave us a hard time for opening a new bottle of coke we brought in, but said nothing to the dinner guest at the table in front of us who kept checking her phone. Pictures aren’t allowed, texting shouldn’t be either.

Had a great time at Magic of Polynesia while staying at the Holiday Inn Waikiki Beachcomber March 2015 — could not figure out any of the illusions and the close up magic was shot by a video camera and I still could not spot how he did it — magic!

This is the second time I came here. This time with my family. The overall organization of the shows and entertainment is great and well managed.
I gotta salute the BYU foundation for employing students and also support the community.
Having said that, I think this kind of place is only fun for first timers as I dont have as much fun and dont see any changes despite going here for the 2^nd time in 4 years.

Never been to a magic show before but this on was well worth it! We only went to the show and skipped dinner. Parked at the Ross parking garage but I recommend parking in the holiday inn garage where the show is held. Its 6 bucks when they validate.
Took hubby to the show for his birthday and he absolutely LOVED it! We were disappointed when it came to an end. The dancers were great and the crowd interaction was pretty funny. All around a really good time and our waitress Jasmine was really great as well!!!
Put it this way. My hubby isn’t a big fan of the island. But I took him to this show and he is still thanking me for the gift. Said its the best time he has had here so far and he has been here for almost a year!
Keep up the good work!

LOVED IT! Wonderful show… great mix of Magic & Traditional Hawaiian flare. Our Waitress Jasmine was WONDERFUL… we tipped her 100% for being so attentive to us.
During the show they interact with the Audience a lot… the best part is the Language barriers. Loved it & will certainly recommend this place to others!
Wish we could’ve taken pix or video during the show… it was pretty awesome!

My husband and I went here for date night (9÷13÷2014) excellent show. The main guy John Hirokawa, did a FANTASTIC Job getting the audience involved. We were impressed with the show from start to finish and would go again. Some of his magic show we had seen before on TV from other ppl performing it, but only a couple things; the show kept you guessing what was going to happen next. I would of given the show a 5 star, but upon arrival at 4:30PM to pick up our tickets we were informed the show was starting an hr before it’s scheduled original time due to a concert that had taken place earlier in the day. My husband asked if we would of been contacted and the gentleman said «NO» this is HUGE, what if we wouldn’t of come to get our tickets until right before the show. We scheduled our tickets only 4 days in advance. We were told 4 days prior the show started at 7PM, good thing we told our childcare provider that we wanted to go to dinner before hand otherwise we would of missed it and been out our CASH! We bought our Tickets on Living Social at a great price. We decided just to go to the show instead of the Show and Dinner as the Dinner menu had items we don’t care for.
Even with the mishap with time of show starting we would go again. It is a MUST see. Make sure to check Living Social for deals.

We were fortunate to have john as the magician rather than the back up so that was nice. He was really funny and got quite a few laughs in. He did some really cool magic acts that we were in shock about. They had hula dancers and fire dancers in between acts so a good way to see that stuff not on a beach for a good price. Some audience interaction seemed a little staged but hey that’s not something that’s new. All in all great fun and good for kids if you have them. They also have servers bringing drinks so you can watch while sipping on cocktails which is always a plus in my book

This is based just on the show: The interaction with the crowd was hilarious and fun. Some of the tricks were awe inspiring, but they were repeated. I was glad I got the groupon that was half off. Otherwise, I don’t think the full amount is worth it.

My friends from the mainland were here on their honeymoon and wanted to check this out. Felt kinda fun to play tourist since my bf and I never do these kinds of things.
We just got tickets for the show as the reviews here didn’t sound like it was worth it to get the dinner. We just ordered some smoothies… They were pretty average but at least it was something to sip on during the show.
The show was great! It wasn’t John but the magician we had was funny. I liked how he interacted with the crowd and the foreigners who volunteered were hilarious. Some of tricks weren’t so mind-​blowing but we still had fun.
I thought it was $ 33 per ticket for kama’aina but we paid $ 44 each. Would do this again if friends or relatives come to visit for something fun to do besides swimming lol.

I went on a night when Kyle Kaneshiro was performing, not John, which was fine with me. My parents and I were taking an out of town guest. M+D have been to the John show before and liked it a lot. Dad said Kyle was good too, different tricks and show so at least they werent watching the same thing over again, but dad also thought the Kyle could use more polish for his tricks and rushed through a lot of them. Keep the audience in suspense Kyle!
Showtime itself ran 1 hr and we attended the dinner beforehand which also lasted 1.5 hrs=2.5 hrs total. The food wasn’t the great but i was expecting that. Portions were large.
Its something fun to do at night in waikiki for tourists and can be fun for locals ‘playing tourist’ too. Discounted tickets from any medium (military, groupon etc) would make this a worthwhile show but I suggest skipping dinner and just attending the performance.

Just left the show and I was genuinely impressed. Especially for the fact I am from Las Vegas where entertainment standards are held up with the highest regards. My server was extremely accommodating to our party of 6 which included a toddler.
The magician John Hirokama pulled it off and really made the illusions seem real. I only left guessing if he had twins who were the help or if it was the real deal. Perfect ingredients for the illusions. Well done.

Took the family out to play tourist tonight. Jon was off tonight and performing tonight was Michael Villoria. It is nowhere near a multi-​million dollar vegas production but much better than I expected. I personally think it had too many hula between the tricks but it is catered to tourists so it was expected.
Magic show itself was pretty good, similar tricks were performed over and over and just when I was getting bored they brought out the fire dancer and he was awesome.
Best part of the night was when they brought up a japanese tourist to perform an impromptu swaparoo trick with the large trunk. Mr. Suzuki stole the show tonight. He was so awkward and language barrier jokes were hilarious.
We went for the show only so no review on the dinner. They offer a great kamaaina discount so definitely worth a trip to waikiki for something different than catching a movie. We had a great time!