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Criss Angel

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Criss Angel
Born	Christopher Nicholas Sarantakos December 19, 1967 (age 43) Long Island, New York, U.S.
Occupation	Magician, Illusionist, musician, songwriter, hypnotist, stunt performer, actor, escapologist
Years active	1997-present
Net worth	US$17 million (2010)
Religion	Orthodox Christian
Spouse	JoAnn Winkhart (2002-2005) (divorced)
Website
CrissAngel.com

Christopher Nicholas Sarantakos (born December 19, 1967), better known by the stage name Criss Angel, is an American illusionist, stunt performer, musician, and actor. He is best known for starring in the television show, Criss Angel Mindfreak and his live performance illusion show Criss Angel Believe in artistic collaboration with Cirque du Soleil at the Luxor casino in Las Vegas, Nevada.

He made numerous special television guest appearances on WWE Raw, The Oprah Winfrey Show, The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson, Jimmy Kimmel Live!, The Megan Mullally Show, The Ellen Show,AVN Awards Show 2007 and Larry King Live on CNN. He also made a guest acting appearance on the hit television shows CSI: NY and Las Vegas.

Early life

Son of Greek-Americans John and Dimitra Sarantakos, Christopher Nicholas Sarantakos was raised in East Meadow, Long Island, New York, with two brothers, Costa and J.D His father owned a restaurant and doughnut shop and was devoted to personal fitness before dying of cancer in 1998.[1] Angel was first introduced to magic at age 6, after his Aunt Stella taught him a card trick. His interest grew and by the time he graduated from East Meadow High School, he was not interested in attending college. He aimed at becoming a professional magician.

Television

Criss Angel Mindfreak

Main article: Criss Angel Mindfreak

Criss Angel was the creator of the A&E Network show Criss Angel Mindfreak. Seasons 1 and 2 were filmed at The Aladdin in Las Vegas, with Season 3 at the Luxor Las Vegas. Premiering on July 20, 2005, the illusions have included walking on water, levitating, walking up the side of Luxor Hotel (in the light of 39 focused lamps that can be seen from space[2]), floating between two buildings, causing a Lamborghini to disappear, surviving in an exploding C4 Crate, cutting himself in half in full view of an audience and getting run over by a steamroller while lying on a bed of broken glass. Also in season 3 he was known for jumping out of a moving car. Angel was injured and stopped production for 3 weeks.[3]

Criss Angel Believe

Main article: Criss Angel Believe

Criss Angel collaborated with Cirque du Soleil to create Criss Angel Believe, a live show at the Luxor casino in Las Vegas, which starred Criss Angel, who was billed as "co-writer, illusions creator and designer, original concept creator and star."[4]

Angel originally tried to develop the show for a Broadway run, as well as other casinos. Eventually, what became Believe came together when he entered a partnership with Cirque du Soleil and the Luxor's parent company, MGM Mirage, financed the show with $100 million.[4]

After several delays, the show was set for a Gala opening on October 31, 2008, with preview shows in late September.[5][6][7] The initial preview was not well received, with thoroughly negative audience reactions.[8][9]The show opened to equally harsh reviews which cited a lack of the magic Angel is known for, as well as a confusing and uninteresting theme. Reviewers felt neither Angel nor Cirque du Soleil were able to perform to their capabilities.[10][11][12][13] In April 2009, Angel ended a performance of Believe by "hurling obscene insults" at Perez Hilton, who was an audience member. Hilton reportedly had texted to his fans during the performance that the show was "unbelievably BAD" and that he'd "rather be getting a root canal", and word had gotten back to Angel by the end of the performance.[14][15] Cirque du Soleil later apologized to Hilton for Angel's remarks.[16] [17]

Phenomenon

Starting in October 2007 he appeared as a judge on Phenomenon, with Uri Geller and in a CNN interview about the show he told Larry King "no one has the ability, that I'm aware of, to do anything supernatural, psychic, talk to the dead. And that was what I said I was going to do with Phenomenon. If somebody goes on that show and claims to have supernatural psychic ability, I'm going to bust [him] live and on television."[18]

On the October 31, 2007 episode of the reality show Phenomenon, Paranormalist Jim Callahan performed a summoning, purportedly of author Raymond Hill, to help discover the contents of a locked box.[19] Although fellow judge Uri Geller praised the performance, Angel called it "comical" and subsequently challenged both Callahan and Geller to guess the contents of two envelopes he pulled out of his pocket, offering a million dollars of his own money to whoever could do so. This led to an argument between Callahan and Angel, during which Callahan walked toward Angel and called him an "ideological bigot", with the two pulled apart as the show promptly went to a commercial break. Angel has since revealed the contents of one envelope and at the unveiling he challenged Geller one more time. Geller responded, "Although we were born one day apart - I was born on the 20th of December and you on the 19th - a lot of years between us - 40 years, you were one year old when I came out with my spoon bending..." Criss Angel cut him off at this point, saying, "I guess this is a 'no,'" and proceeded to open the envelope. The envelope contained an index card with the numbers "911" printed on it for September 11, 2001. Criss' explanation was this: "If on 9-10 somebody could have predicted that 9-11 was going to happen, they could have saved thousands of lives". Some Geller supporters point out Geller did mention the numbers one and 19 and count it as a success since he did get the digits right. Geller in fact mentioned five digits in his speech (0, 1, 2, 4, 9) as well as the month of December. The other envelope's contents was scheduled to be revealed on the first episode of Season 4 of Criss Angel: Mindfreak. However, the contents of the other envelope were never revealed and remain a mystery to this day.

Other media

Angel with Tommy Lee

Angel was parodied in The Simpsons episode The Great Simpsina.

Angel was loosely parodied in Ugly Americans episode Kill Mark Kill as Christ Angel, Leonard's older yet younger-looking brother.

Angel was parodied in Robot Chicken. In the episode I Love Her, Criss Angel becomes a substitute teacher at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and tries to use Mindfreak on Harry Potter and his friends.

In 2011, Angel appeared in an Orville Redenbacher popcorn commercial.

In 2011, Angel appeared as himself in an episode of Rules of Engagement.

Angel was also parodied in season 4, episode 12, Criss Angel is a Douchebag of Supernatural. The episode featured a young magician performing flashy tricks to generic sounding dark rock music, while wearing goth makeup and costume, as a foil to the elderly magicians casting real and harmful spells.

Personal life

In 2002, Angel married his longtime girlfriend JoAnn Winkhart (now JoAnn Sarantakos). The couple filed for divorce four years later.[1] Although Angel was seen with his wife in the buried alive illusion (season 1, episode 6, 2005) and the body suspension illusion (season 1, episode 5, 2005), she was not credited as his wife; rather, she was listed as "Criss's Girl". During the divorce proceedings, the attorney for Angel's estranged wife claimed that their relationship was kept secret to further Angel's career.[20]

In November 2008, Angel began dating Holly Madison, former girlfriend of Hugh Hefner.[21] The relationship ended in February 2009.[22]

Books