Salvage Yard - Ringhole

Have you seen Ringhole yet? It’s a pretty vanish and an interesting reappearance, but the presentation he has for it (starting at 45 seconds in) is soooo dumb. Any thoughts on how you might present this? —AF

You’re correct. The presentation he offers here: “I have a packet of Skittles from another dimension and it has your ring in it,” is mind-bogglingly stupid. Why—in this other dimension—are rings in Skittles packets? I mean, it would be one thing if you could say, “I got this packet of Skittles from another dimension,” and you opened it up and 30 copies of their ring fell out. “In the other dimension Skittles is a jewelry brand. Jewelry is considered cheap and disposable. Candy, on the other hand, is cherished and highly valued. People propose with gumdrops.” I mean, that’s not good, but it at least gives their mind something to consider. Whereas, “These Skittles are from another dimension. That’s why your ring is in it,” just seems lazy.

The ad copy says:

Borrow a ring from a spectator and cause that ring to magically and visually disappear right at your fingertips, just like real magic. You explain that their ring actually went through the "Ringhole" into another dimension.

Like, come on, guys. What the fuck are you talking about.

The obvious presentation for this effect is probably the best. There’s already an inherent “story” with a ring appearing in a bag of candy. So you borrow the ring. Vanish it. Try to bring it back, but you can’t. “I’m sorry. It’s not coming back for some reason. That’s weird,” you say, as you pluck in the air, as if trying to pull the ring out from the ether. “Oh well. Fortunately it was a just a cheap trinket and nothing important. Let’s see… what’s next….”

When they’re like, “That was my wedding ring.”

You say, “Haha. Very funny. Wait… seriously? That hunk of shit? No. That can’t be. That’s the type of ring you get in a gumball machine or they give out free with a bag of peanut M&Ms or something. Actually… that reminds me… I just got this earlier today.”

And finish it off that way.

That’s not a presentation I love. But that—or something similar—is the presentation that would make sense with this effect.

Is there another more meaningful presentation to be found here? Maybe. But it’s difficult to create a “meaningful” presentation for an arbitrary trick. It makes much more sense to think of an interesting premise first and then imagine what type of trick you could do to demonstrate that premise.

Here’s how that would NOT look.

Hmmm… what’s an interesting premise? Oh! I know. How about traveling into other dimension? Okay… but how would I demonstrate that? Maybe… make a spectator’s ring vanish and reappear in a bag of Swedish Fish?