Gardyloo #78

/

Once early December rolls around, I hope you will take a moment and remember the “day that will live in infamy.” No, I’m not talking about Pearl Harbor. I’m talking about another senseless tragedy.

brookslecture.jpg

That’s right, you can stop your clamoring, your prayers have been answered. Our old pal, Brooksy, is having a magic lecture.

Here is the facebook event post.

I know you’re thinking, Oh, what’s your angle here, Andy? Are you going to say Steve won’t be teaching his Bill in Lemon trick because he keeps eating the lemon?

How dare you. I’d never say that.

Were you going to say that this line from the ad:

WARNING: Due to the hands on nature of this workshop seating will be limited to the first 20 PAID reservations.

Should really say this:

WARNING: Due to the hands on nature of this workshop bring a deck of cards that you don’t mind getting chicken grease on.

No! Knock it off. I won’t tolerate such disrespect.

All I want to say is that I hope Steve’s lecture/workshop goes well. And if there are any Jerx supporters in the area of Haines House of Cards (Norwood, OH) who would like to go, I will reimburse you the cost of your ticket. You just have to send me a pic or some other proof you went. I’m completely serious. I want to pack the place for Steve.

We got some big news from our brothers at Vanishing Inc. this week.

Screen Shot 2018-10-25 at 3.11.55 PM.png

I was hoping we would finally get the news we all know is coming, that Josh is carrying Andi’s baby. Sadly, that wasn’t the big announcement. This was:

“Effective immediately, Joshua Jay and Andi Gladwin (on behalf of Vanishing Inc) are pleased to announce the purchase of Art of Magic and all its content from Dan and Dave Buck.”

Okay, that’s a little less #exciting than I had hoped, but whatever. They’re two quality organizations and I think they’ll mesh well together. It’s a good acquisition for them.

Speaking of…, if Vanishing Inc. or anyone else is interested, The Jerx is also for sale. $84 OBO.

In the fall issue of the X-Comm newsletter, I mentioned Michael Weber’s Charge Card effect and its use with Marc Kerstein’s ChargeMe app.

Well, Marc informs me that ChargeMe is no longer available in the app store because Apple didn’t like an app that mimicked the battery charging aspect of the iPhone. So if you were going to get the Charge Card to use with this app, then don’t.

Marc may try and come up with some workaround for the app that Apple will approve of, or we may bury it somewhere in the Jerx app. I’ll keep you updated if either of those things come to pass.

In response to Monday’s Witch’s House post, reader Daniel Lee suggested doing a version of the Trapdoor Card with a Stranger Things style of presentation. So one side of the page would have a relatively normal, colorful drawing, and the other would have some ominous image in black and grey representing the “Upside Down.”

I think it’s a good idea when presenting the effect to someone who is familiar with the show. I haven’t done it myself, and I don’t see myself saying, “Here’s a trick about Stranger Things!” But I might perform it and approach it more obliquely. “Have you seen Stranger Things? My girlfriend’s sister teaches elementary school and apparently they have a kid who acts out in the same way as the kid on that show. Like he freezes up and when he snaps out of it he implies he’s seen some other plane of existence. But not in those words. At first I thought she was saying that he’s imitating the kid on the show, but then she told me it was something he did before the show even aired. She gave me this picture he drew….”

I would probably experiment with not showing the other side of the paper first. That way, when the other side is revealed, their first instinct will be, “Oh, well you just turned it around or something.” Then it will dawn on them that I couldn’t have just turned it around since they were holding it the whole time. 

More Friends of the Jerx with some notable accomplishments in the sphere of magic for the general public’s consumption…

First, famously non-pregnant magician, Joshua Jay, is going to be on the Tonight Show tonight, October 26th. Set your DVRs. Or, if you don’t have anything better to do, watch it live.

But here’s the thing, if your life is at the point where you feel you don’t have anything better to do than stay home and watch Joshua Jay on the Tonight Show on a Friday night, then you actually do have something better to do. It’s called suicide.

✿✿✿

Last week I mentioned Justin Flom’s new book for kids who are interested in magic. At the other end of the age spectrum, we have Allan Kronzek’s new book, Grandpa Magic. This is a book for people who want to use magic to entertain their grandchildren. What a good idea. I read the preview on Amazon. It looks like it will be a pretty fun read.

61LcetUtCML._SX450_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg

If nothing else, the cover and illustrations are so much more pleasant than Allan’s previous magic book for the public.

51VGR2CVsEL._SX328_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg

Who is the monster that designed this hideous book cover for young magicians? Has he never met a kid? Or does he just hate them?

Dover always had the bleakest covers. If you saw this book from across the room and couldn’t read the title you’d say, “What’s that? A book on what to do with your loved one’s possessions after watching them die from gallbladder cancer?” No, no. This is a book about magic aimed at young people.

How does Dover choose the color palette for their magic books? Do they just mix a giant vat of shit and vomit together until they capture the color of chronic depression?

Chris Grace in an actor and comedian who I haven’t met before, but I have seen him do improv in NYC a few years ago, as we have a couple of friends in common. He stumbled on this site recently and I’m glad he did because he makes me laugh. He sent along the video below which has him re-dubbing the demo for Cameron Francis’ trick, Captivated. As I mentioned on Wednesday, I hate the brand of patter Cameron uses in that trick. Here Chris ratchets the stupidity of that type of patter up profoundly and it’s actually much more entertaining, in my opinion.

My friend Stasia, who is the illustrator on the forthcoming book (as well as JV1), has been doing “Inktober” on her Instagram. This is a drawing challenge where people draw one ink picture per day in the month of October based on some prompt words. Here are some of my favorites…

The Nearness of You

/

This is something I’ve written about before in other posts, but I wanted to devote a post specifically to the subject because it’s something I see frequently. It’s a type of bad patter that I people use all the time. The following example comes from a new release by Cameron Francis called, Captivated.

“So I was having a chat with a magician friend of mine the other day. And I said, ‘You know what, I want do an effect that really captures my audience’s attention. Using just 8 cards: the four aces and the four kings.’”

And then he goes on to tell the story of a past performance of the trick to accompany himself performing that trick in the present.

Now, to be fair, most patter in online demos delivered to the camera is bad. It’s not really conducive to something more interesting. And I have no idea how Cameron would actually present this in real life. For a youtube demo, this patter is fine. But I have seen people perform almost identical patter to real humans in real life, and in that context it’s terrible.

✿✿✿

One of the best things about close-up magic is the immediacy of it. It’s something that’s happening “in this place” and “at this moment.” Only magicians would think to screw this up by distancing the spectator from the effect. “Here’s something that once happened with me and some other guy I know.”

Here’s the thing, if you don’t think, “This ace will turn over. And now so will this one. And now they’ll turn to kings,” is an interesting enough thing to talk about in the present tense, then it’s certainly not interesting enough to tell a story about.

I know why people do it. It’s a defensive approach to showing magic. Instead of confidently suggesting you have something interesting to show them, you couch it in the presentation of “this thing that happened to you.” Sometimes it’s even further removed than that. Sometimes it’s, “this thing that happened to another guy once.”

  • “While he wasn’t looking I shuffled his deck face up into face down.”

  • “I was certain I put the card in the middle of the deck, but the next time I looked, it was back on top.”

  • “One time a gambler bet a magician a million dollars he couldn’t cut to four of a kind.”

✿✿✿

The close cousin to the “here’s something that happened once,” style of patter is the, “magic trick as analogy” patter. This is where you tell a story and the coins or the cards represent something else. This is another case where you’re making it not about the present moment.

I’m speaking to the social/amateur magician here. Maybe Eugene Burger could get away with telling the Hindu creation story alongside his performance of Gypsy Thread, but in the real world when performing for friends, acquaintances, and family it’s a very alienating thing to do. Are you someone who would normally tell the Hindu creation story? Probably not. So it only comes off as a justification to show the trick. Which again suggests that the trick itself isn’t worth their time on its own.

✿✿✿

In social magic, the presentation should ultimately be about the two (or more) of us in the room and the magic that is happening in that moment. It may sound like I’m advocating for breaking down the fourth wall in your presentations. I’m not. In social magic there is no fourth wall. Social magic is an interaction, not a show.

✿✿✿

If you’re a social magician and you want to perform a trick like the one Cameron performs above (a longer, multi-phase card trick) then you would likely only show it to someone who likes you and who likes these sorts of tricks. (This is not the sort of thing you would spring on someone as a first trick when you meet them.) So if that’s true—if they like you and they like card tricks—then the only baseline patter you need is: “Hey, I’ve been working on something and I want to get your thoughts on it.” This Peek Backstage style is not only good because it’s simple and “honest.” It’s good because it focuses the magic on this present moment. “I want your feedback on this thing I’m showing you now,” is a normal human interaction that concentrates their attention on what’s happening now.

I’m not saying you shouldn’t strive for a presentation that is more compelling and interesting than that. I’m just saying that default presentation is good enough and it doesn’t make sense to replace it with something worse. Add a good story or add no story. And if you add a story it should be one that leads up and into the present moment. Not something like, “So this one time a guy took a card and it turned into another card and blah, blah, blah…”

Don’t add a dull story just so you can check the “presentation” box.

✿✿✿

Here are some examples of other generic, present-tense presentations:

“Here’s this weird thing that happened to me once… and here’s how it affects me to this day.”

“There’s this old ritual I read about… let’s see if it works now.”

‘I found this strange object… let’s see what it does.”

‘I read about this psychological game… and I’ve been waiting to meet up with you so we could test it out.’

You see how each of these—even if there is a backstory to it—all play out in the present moment. The benefit of this is that it can seem like neither of us know for certain what’s going to happen next. And that should make for a more exciting effect, more-so than me just relating a story.

✿✿✿

Ultimately this comes down to the professional/amateur divide. As a professional, it makes perfect sense that you would tell stories and illustrate them with magic. A professional magic show is not designed to feel like a normal human exchange. So heightening the theatricality is an understandable choice when performing a “show.”

The thing to understand about social magic is that' it’s not just an informal close-up show in a coffee shop. It’s designed to happen within an interaction. That’s its strength. And it’s the reason why a spectator can’t experience social magic while watching a video of it, because they’re removed from that incident. If your goal is to do an informal show in a coffee-shop, that’s fine, and you can just follow the precepts established for the professional magician. But if your goal is to create the unique experience of social magic, then any choice you make in presentation that takes away from the immediacy of the performance is a bad one.

The Witch's House

/

Are you familiar with this trick The Trapdoor Card by Robert Neale? I think it’s one of Neale’s more famous creations. Here is a variation done with a dollar bill. And here are a bunch of different variations with cards and other stuff as performed by the world’s greatest grandpa.

Over the years, I’ve done the variation with a bill (Wonderland Dollar) which doesn’t require the spectator to close their eyes, and I’ve done it with a playing card as well. I never really got it to feel like much more than a puzzle, but for the people I knew who liked puzzles, it could be an interesting thing to show them. In all, it was an effect I liked, but didn’t love.

Then, right around the beginning of 2018, I got an email from Nico Ruiz about a trick he does with his 6-year old daughter, Kala.

Here is part of his email:

As I told you, the trick is done by my daughter. She tells the story of a little witch who lived in the forest away from the village, but when she left, some lumberjacks from the village went into her house to eat and steal her precious sweets, so she made a curse: Everyone who entered her house in her absence would automatically find themselves outside, by magic. So she shows a drawing of her house and asks the spectator to hold the door of the house on the inside, hold it very tightly. And depending on the moment, she covers the drawing with a handkerchief or asks them to close their eyes, and instantly the spectator is holding the door on the outside. The truth is that she has a lot of fun doing this trick dressed in her witch hat.

Here’s the little witch herself.

Untitled 3.jpg

When I got the email I thought, “Oh, that’s cute.” But I didn’t really put that much thought into it.

A few weeks ago I decided this might be something fun to try for myself. I’d scribble a little picture and throw it in my wallet. Then I could tell people about this story my niece made up about a witch and a house and some lumberjacks and a curse. And then I’d pull the picture out and say she drew it the other day and she says it’s the house from the story.

“I didn’t think the picture was very good. And I was going to tell her to work on a few more revisions to have her get it to the point where it lived up to my high standards. But then I found something interesting about this drawing that made up for the poor artistic skills.”

“So, the way my niece told the story was, the lumberjacks would enter the house, then their eyes would get heavy and close, and when they opened them, they’d find they were on the outside of the house.”

“Here’s the weird thing about this drawing. Right now you’re on the inside of the house. Take a hold of the door with your hand. Now there’s no way for me to turn the paper, and the only way for you to get to the outside of the house, without letting go, would be if you somehow went through this door.”

“Don’t let go, not even for a second. Now let your eyes grow heavy and close, like the lumberjacks in the story. Now open them… and look… somehow you’re on the outside of the house.”

And I performed it like that for a few people and their reactions were much more in line with seeing something magical, rather than just seeing something puzzling.

I think there are two reasons for this.

First, a child’s drawing is something that has some emotional weight to it. Much more-so than a card or a bill. And the idea that maybe a child drew something that has some strange property is inherently more interesting than, “I’m going to fold a playing card and you’ll go from looking at the front to looking at the back.”

Second, there is a very straightforward clarity to the effect with this version. You’re inside the house, then you’re outside the house. The hole in the middle represents a doorway in the picture, emphasizing that this is a door, not just a flap in a bill or card. This strengthens the idea that the only way to get to the other side is to go through the door. When it’s just a flap, that symbolism is lost.

In Neale’s version, the flap is also a picture of a door, but his story that went along with it was too abstract for me. He talks about how in every town there is a white wall with a green door and if you go through the door you’re in a garden and when you come back out your spirit is renewed. What does that mean? I don’t know. I’m not sure any spectator would know either.

Even though it’s just a cosmetic change, I think the simplicity of “inside and outside” really helps cement the effect in the spectators mind. “There was a picture of the inside of a house on one side of a piece of paper and the outside of the house on the other and a little cut-out door in the middle. I was standing on the “inside” side of the paper, holding the door. Then I closed my eyes, and when I opened them, I was now on the “outside” side of the paper even though I had never let go.” That sounds like a magic trick, not just a puzzle.

The story that goes along with it is so simple that literally a 6-year old can tell it and understand it. And it helps reinforce where you start and end up. You’re in the witch’s house and then she kicks you out. Simple. As Neale has said, the most important thing is for people to really understand what side they start on. This version makes it 100% clear.

Some final thoughts:

- The trick isn’t mine to teach. You can see Robert Neale teaching it in the Celebration of Sides download here. I don’t do the push-through action he does in that download, I do more of a folding action, like in the clips in the first paragraph. Because I keep the drawing folded and in my wallet, I can fold right along the creases already established in the drawing. I fold it and unfold it when their eyes are closed. I’m not trying to hide that I’m doing something to the drawing. But with them holding onto it, it doesn’t seem like I could be doing something that changes the orientation in any way.

- Here is a pdf of Nico’s house drawing. You can print it double-sided on a piece of paper if you want to try it out. If you’re going to carry it around with you, you should draw your own version. I do mine a little bigger than this.

- I also have a full-size version I put on my refrigerator, just waiting for someone to say, “Hey, why do you have such a cruddy drawing on your refrigerator?”

IMG_3899.JPG

- I’ve also done it without out the niece story. I just say it’s an old drawing I once made but there’s something strange about it. I have them hold the door on the “inside” side. Then I have them close their eyes, take a step forward, and turn the other direction. (As if they’ve stepped out of doorway and turned around.) And when the open up their eyes, they’re looking at the side, yet they’ve never let go of the picture.

Thanks to Nico and Kala for sharing their version of the trick.

Gardyloo #77

/

Hey-o, I’m back, and as adequate as ever.

The past week wasn’t a vacation. I was putting the finishing touches on Book #2 and writing the next issue of the X-Comm newsletter, which Year 3 supporters will receive later today.

I was also doing some preparation for the next round of focus group testing. Specifically the testing we’re going to do on controls. I was practicing some of the questions we’re going to ask on some non-magician friends, just to make sure things were clear.

I first explained the idea of controls to them in the most basic way. I wanted to see if this is something that laypeople already have an understanding of. Most non-magicians know about forcing a card, but do they understand controls too? So I explained how when you choose a card and it’s returned to the deck, the magician may shuffle it and mix the cards, but it’s possible he still knows where the card is or has controlled it to a specific position. Each of the four people I talked with this about were like, “Yeah, of course.” (And they were all asked this separately, not together.) They didn’t know the term “control,” but the concept was innately understood.

I guess that should have been obvious to me, but I felt I needed to ask anyway.

But here’s why I’m mentioning this. I told them I wanted to show them some ways a card could be returned and lost in the deck. “Some of these are controls, and some aren’t,” I told them. I lied. They were all controls. But with two of the ones I showed them, they were 100% convinced they were not controls. They even laughed at the question, “Do you think I controlled your card that time?”

If that trend holds up when we do the full testing, you’re going to have at least two controls that you can be fully confident are truly fooling. They might not be appropriate for every situation due to some constraints, but you should probably be able to work one or the other into many or most tricks.

The even better news is that they’re both easy.

We’re not doing the testing until the end of November, and I won’t have the write-up on it until well after that, but it’s something to look forward to.

From the Failure Files: Hair Raising

I once thought about making another blog that just talked about all the stuff I’ve tried that didn’t end up working, then I realized that was a dumb idea. But I’ll occasionally post some things that didn’t work here. Maybe you’ll come up with an idea that does work based one of my failed attempts

main.original.600x0c.jpg

This idea involved having someone with long hair push all her hair behind her shoulders, and then pinch a small bit of hair near the front of her scalp and pull it forward so it lay down the front of her chest. So, imagine the blue line here was a small “rat tail” of hair strands.

My thought was I could make the hair levitate using a loop. It’s not the most clever idea I’ve ever had, but I thought it would be an eerily intimate trick because it affected part of the person’s body.

When I first tried it with someone, her hair kind of splayed out along the length of the loop, giving away that something horizontal was lifting it up.

The next two times I tried it, I had them tie a loose knot in their hair, to keep it as one unit. That solved the spreading problem, but both women said I must be using their own hair to make the hair rise. Like they thought I had just snagged a piece of hair and was somehow using that to pull up the rest of their hair. And I couldn’t very well say, “No, no, I’m not using your own hair” because if they reached up to check, they would have found I was using something that might as well have been their own hair.

So that idea is on the scrapheap for now.

Some friends of the site have some recent or upcoming accomplishments that I want to acknowledge.

Justin Flom has a new book of magic for kids coming out on November 13th. I haven’t seen it yet, but I’m sure it’s good. It’s not out for another few weeks, but as I write this post, it’s the #2 current best seller in Children’s Magic books on Amazon. Understandably behind the greatest magic book of our time.

Screen Shot 2018-10-19 at 1.38.33 AM.png

Around the holidays I always get a couple friends asking me what book they should get for their kid about magic. I always just go with the most recent one that’s by someone I know is talented. Kids are drawn to the things that feel of their time. They’re not going to connect to some decrepit old tome talking about thimble magic and foulards. So this year I’m sure I’ll recommend Justin’s book and probably give away a couple copies myself.

✿✿✿

My pal, Toby Halbrooks, is a producer on The Old Man & The Gun, which opens today. I haven’t seen it yet, but I’ll be checking it out out next week. It’s getting great reviews.

They’re saying it’s going to be Robert Redford’s last film, but that’s a lie. He and I are working on a remake of the Fat Boys’ movie, Disorderlies.

✿✿✿

And, as I’m thinking of people who won’t get that last reference, I’m reminded of our darling friend, Alice, who was the JAMM Muse for April 2017, where she posed as Dan Harlan.

download.gif

Now, I tell every model I meet: “Take your modeling cues from the poses of Dan Harlan. That guy is sexuality personified.”

71UNLX6TgFL._SX466_.jpg

Well, Alice had the good sense to listen, and now she’s working with Playboy. You can check her out here.

3.jpg

You know I’ll post any video of someone destroying The Expert at the Card Table. This time a dog got in on the act. I guess he was all done licking up a puddle of his own shit and vomit and figured this couldn’t be any worse.

Here’s a fun game you can play. Almost every day, Penguin Magic sends out an email promoting some product, old or new. And the subject line is always some quote about the product. Whenever I get one of these emails, I like to pretend that they’re from a plastic surgeon who specializes in penile enlargement surgery, and these quotes are from his patients. And now that I’ve told you about it, you’re going to do it in your head whenever you get one of those emails too. So now you’re stuck with it. Sure, it doesn’t always work. But it’s good for a laugh now and then as long as you’re not some sad sack of shit who takes no joy from life. See the examples below.

Check out these quotes from the satisfied customers of award winning plastic surgeon, Dr. Altinsel’s penile enlargement surgery.

"I will use this wherever I go. I love it, love it, love it." -Ira Gurewitz

"Exceeds expectations. GREAT reactions." -Mitchell Rushing

"People started screaming and yelling" -James Wesley

"Dare I say...perfect" -Reynold Fuentes

"AMAZING. I will be using it for sure!" -Romanos

"It surprised me. It also fooled me." -Max Maven

"Turns adults into children." -Rick Lax

"I will use this for the rest of my life." -Steve Haynes

"A dream come true. I'd have paid triple the price." -Reza Mikhaeil

“A whole new spin on a classic" -Rick Lax

"This is the best I have to offer." -Richard Osterlind

Autumn Music Mix

/

Here’s a short mix of some of my favorite music that feels like Autumn to me. I’ve strayed from the theme in some places so it’s not all just wispy vocals and acoustic guitars, although there’s some of that too.

Here I Am by Adam Green and Binki Shapiro

This isn’t just a good autumnal song, it’s a five-star perfect song in my book. It has so many things I love: boy-girl vocals, a counterpoint-esque chorus, and the original version (not the live version below) opens with a gorgeous Beach Boys style harmony featuring overlapping vocals of Binki Shapiro who is amazing (and who is also in the band Little Joy, who was on my summer mix).

Requiem for a Witch by Gloria

Anything with the word “witch” in it is going to seem autumnal. You don’t think of witches on jet skis and shit. Add to that the crisp steel-string acoustic guitar sound and their pretty harmonies and you have a great fall song from my favorite French band.

A New Beginning by Wolfie’s Just Fine

In Friday the 13th, A New Beginning which came out in 1985, there is an extended nude scene with a girl right before the killer stabs her in the eyes with garden shears. Here’s the original death scene (not safe for work—and it’s in French because that’s the only clip I could find).

This song is about a young boy in the mid 80s seeing this and seeing sex and death all mixed up together when he may have had little exposure to either of that before, and the weird mindfuck that was for him.

The video is great. They do a really good job re-enacting the movie.

Yes, Friday the 13th takes place at a summer camp, but it’s still a movie that belongs to the fall and the spooky season..

We Could Walk Together by The Clientele

In a previous post I called The Clientele the greatest autumn band of all time. 95% of their songs would fit on this list. Here is one of their earliest.

Ooh Yah Yah Yah by Sweet Spirit

I love this song, but it doesn’t remind me of fall. However, the video does. I’m a big proponent of renting a house in the woods and staying their with friends for a long weekend once the weather turns cold. After the summer and before skiing/snowboarding season is usually a cheap time to do it. This video reminds me of that sort of thing. Everyone together in a house or sitting around a fire-pit in the chilly night air. That’s my scene.

Monday Morning, Somewhere Central by Ultimate Painting

Ultimate Painting were around for three years and put out three albums and then broke up. In those three albums is a lot of 60s inspired, autumnal music. This is one of my favorites from their album, Dusk.

The Duality of Advanced Preparation

/

This is not a post about fire wallets, but I’m going to start by talking about fire wallets.

This is an anecdote I’ve thought about including in various posts over the years, but I’ve hesitated because I don’t want to hurt the feelings of people that I know. However, I thought of it again in relation to Monday’s post and I decided it’s something we can all benefit from thinking about.

In NYC there are some magicians—some you might even know—who will be hanging out at a bar and they’ll go up to order a drink and stand next to an attractive girl and pull out a fire-wallet and light it up as they go to pay. One of the guys I know who does this acts really cool about it and just lets it burn without commenting on it. The other acts like he’s surprised, “Ah, what the hell is that!” Either way it gets a brief shocked reaction, followed by a couple laughs.

I’ve witnessed this in person easily a couple dozen times. And 100% of the time there is a moment after fire-wallet guy leaves, or when people have peeled off into their own conversations where one of these women will say something to the effect of, “What’s the deal with this goofball and his wallet with the fire?” Sometimes they say it that bluntly, sometimes it’s more like, “So… your friend is…uhm, interesting.”

They’re confused. But not like, “How did he do that?” But like, “Why did he do that?”

They have this sort of look to them.

giphy.gif

I have to be honest, I’m not sure what reaction the fire wallet guys are hoping to get. It does make these women pay attention to them, at least briefly, because they’re blasting fire around their face. And I’ve even seen them occasionally transition from the fire wallet to having a genuine interaction with someone, but it always feels to me like they had to dig themselves out of a hole in order to get to that point. As a way to engage with people, the fire wallet always felt to me a few steps removed from walking up to someone and vomiting on them. Yes, now they have to talk to you, and maybe you could even win them over, but surely it would have been easier just to say, “Hi,” right?

I know I’ll get disagreements on this. People will tell me spectators love the fire wallet. Maybe in context, in a professional performance. But done casually I can almost guarantee that you’re hearing what you hope to hear. Yes, there will be a reaction (because there’s fire involved) but what is it you think people are taking away from it?

It’s not a trick… I mean, if it is a trick, it’s literally the worst trick you could accomplish. It would be like an ironic punishment in an O’Henry story. “Oh, Great Genie, I wish for magical powers!”

“Okay. I will give you the power to set your own wallet on fire!"

“What? Oh fuck. No! Please! Don’t! I’m sorry!”

And if it’s not supposed to be magical, but just meant to be some neat special effect, then, in a social situation, you’re the guy who’s carrying around a wallet that lights on fire to get people to pay attention to him. That’s… not a good look.

This is one half of the duality of Advanced Preparation.

For the social magician, performing in a casual environment, for people he or she just met, concrete signs of advanced preparation will undermine the experience you’re trying to create with your magic.

I once watched a friend perform the brass block penetration trick, the one where you stick a match through a hole in the center of a matchbox, and everyone is like “so what?” then you open the matchbox to show that it’s completely filled with a solid brass block. It got a perfectly fine reaction, and then one of the people watching said, “So… you carry around a little brass block with you?” And you could just hear the slide-whistle of sadness suck the air out of him.

Here’s the thing, the person who said that wasn’t trying to be a jerk. But when people are out in a social situation, they want to be a part of spontaneous, organic interactions. They don’t want to be the target of this thing you were planning at home to spring on whoever happened to be at the bar that night in order to hopefully make yourself look good. Even if they really enjoy the trick, the fact that you walked in that night with the intention of showing it to whoever you bumped into, takes what could be a special moment and turns it generic.

I’m not saying don’t show people magic, and I’m not saying don’t actually do some advanced preparation. Here’s the kind of ironic thing in regards to the fire wallet thing. When I would hang around the people afterwards, someone would inevitably say something like, “Soooo… does your wallet shoot fire too?” I’d be all like, “Ah, no. He’s a good guy, actually. I don’t know what the deal is with the wallet schtick. But yes, I do some magic too. That’s how we know each other.”

“Do you have something to show me?” they might ask.

I’d pat my pockets. “Ehh… nah, not really. I didn’t bring anything. Actually…,” I’d say, and finish the drink from the bottle I was holding, “let’s try this.” I’d then take a bottle cap from the bar, show that it wouldn’t fit in the top, and then melt it through so it was inside the bottle. “Hey, there you go. Magic.” I’d say, and smack the bottle on the table. I’d really underplay it, and immediately bring the subject back to something about them. Meanwhile they’re flipping out and trying to pull me back to live in the moment a little longer. “Wait, wait, wait. What is going on?” And they’re lifting up the bottle and alternating between staring at it and staring at me. And when I slide the bottle off to the side, to be taken away by the bartender. They again have to pause and take in the moment. “You’re just going to let him take that?”

Now, the truth is, that trick requires much more advanced preparation than throwing a fire wallet in your back pocket, but that’s not how it feels to the people who see it. And that is its strength. If I had walked in with a Coca Cola bottle that I brought with me. “Hey, have you seen these weird new cola bottles they have at the store down the street?” I suspect the response would be about 30% as intense. Yes, it would be the identical trick, but a completely different feel for the spectator because the way I perform it there are no outward signs of advanced preparation. (Yes, the fact that I have the ability at all to do this would suggest that it’s something I’ve practiced in the past, but that’s a much subtler suggestion of preparation than coming in with my own props or some heavily scripted patter.)

This is one of the reasons I’m much more of a coffee shop performer than I am a bar performer. At a cafe you have, I think, many more options for items you might have with you, without it feeling like you’re setting the other person up. Normal people do bring their work or hobbies to the cafe. So it’s not unheard of that in my laptop bag I might have some books or some other objects to use as hooks. Even a deck of cards can be a “normal” object that you might have on you for various reasons. Whereas if you bring it into a bar it’s like, “Oh, I guess this guy planned to show people card tricks tonight.”

But this post is about the duality of advanced preparation. I think most people will agree with what I’ve written above. Maybe they hadn’t put much thought into it, but it makes sense. Yes, just because some object fits in your pocket, doesn’t mean it’s natural to try and pull out in casual situations.

But something else to consider is the flip-side of advanced preparation, which is this: When it comes to performing for friends, family and other people who are close to you, you will often want to emphasize the preparation that has gone into what you’re about to show them. In fact, you’ll often want to fabricate it for them even when it doesn’t exist.

Certainly you’ll still want to perform seemingly spontaneous moments of magic. But you can also make a person feel special and give some weight to an experience by implying you’ve put in some effort and planning so you can do something specifically for them.

Examples:

  1. I send you an email a month before I visit to say I have this trick I’ve been working on that I can’t wait to show you.

  2. I send you a text asking if you can stop by a couple nights from now. “I have this thing I want to try out, but I need someone with your disposition to make it work.”

  3. I pick you up for a weekend getaway. I’ve found the hotel and planned our meals, but the primary purpose of the mini-vacation is because the place we’re going is on a latitude that I think will allow for this weird experience where I’ll be able to control your dreams.

Or whatever.

The duality (and dichotomy) of advanced preparation is that—when performing for strangers—it minimizes their role in what’s going on (i.e. “well, he was set to show this to anyone he happened to meet tonight”). But—when performing for friends and family—it can emphasize their role in the effect and their importance to the experience.

The most obvious analogue is romance. Imagine your spectator is the object of your affections. If you just met, they would want to feel like they’re having a genuine, organic interaction, not that you’ve come in with a bunch of pre-planned lines that you were going to deliver to whoever was standing at the bar that night. But, once you’ve been together a while, not only are the spontaneous moments of affection appreciated, but so are the ones you’ve obviously put effort into preparing specifically for them.

Bye, my loves. See you next Friday.

giphy (1).gif

A Critical Examination of Pens that Shoot Little Balls of Fire

/

Uh-oh, looks like we’ve got a little controversy brewing. SansMinds is releasing a sharpie that shoots a little ball of fire. And Ellusionist is also releasing a Sharpie that shoots a little ball of fire. And, apparently another guy who runs a place called House of Fire has been selling a Sharpie that shoots a little ball of fire for a while now.

It’s certainly a problem trying to sort all this out. By that I mean the legal or ethical issues in regards to intellectual property and which of these companies you support.

But I’m not here to talk about those problems.

I’m here to talk about the bigger problem which is the fact that this sort of thing looks fucking ridiculous.

IMG_5724.GIF

I know that’s just a gif and there’s no sound so if you really want to enjoy the real-world experience of this, make a gentle “pffft” sound between your teeth and lips to really experience the savage power of this fireball!

What exactly is the reaction you expect this to garner other than an incredulous, “You spent money on a Sharpie that shoots a little ball of fire? Isn’t there a foodbank in your area you could have donated to?” There’s nothing magical about this. The best response you could hope for is, “Neat. Do it again.” To which you’d have to reply, “Uh.. yeah sure, okay. Uhm… can you be a dear and hold on for a minute while I cram some flash cotton and flash paper into this hole in my Sharpie?”

Ellusionist is much smarter than SansMinds. In their trailer, which is over a minute, they don’t show a single unedited clip of their Pyro Pen in action. They don’t want you to see how underwhelming it is in real life. Instead, every clip is slowed down to the point where it seems you’re going to be shooting an impressive stream of fire. You’re not. Ellusionist is on a big pre-sale kick for this right now. They have to be. They know that once this is out in the wild and people see what it actually looks like, their sales will pop and fizzle like… well, like the little nugget of fire this marker ejects.

Here’s the thing, when you perform magic you can choose to come off as someone with supernatural powers, or you can try to come off as just a normal person who has learned some interesting or mysterious things. Whether you’re going for all-powerful entity or normal guy who knows some cool stuff, a sharpie that shoots a dollop of fire is not helping you. Instead of “powerful” or “normal’ you come off as “a guy who’s desperate for people to acknowledge his presence so he bought a little trick marker.”

“Ah, but Andy, fire gets people’s attention.” Yeah, so does screaming the N-word or taking a shit on the floor. Getting people’s attention isn’t difficult. Doing it in a way that doesn’t make you look desperate is the key. Look, if at any moment you could casually look around and shoot a stream of fire from the palm of your empty hand, that would be cool. It would seem incredible. But these sort of half-measures—where you have a big bulky wristband or a gimmicked marker shooting off little pops of fire—they’re not going to get you the reaction you’re hoping for.

That being said, I do appreciate that Ellusionist has their typical sterling ad copy to go along with this…

If James Bond were real, this is the kind of pen he'd have stuffed in the top pocket of his bulletproof suit.

Ah yes, in fact I hear he actually does carry around this pen in the next Bond movie… James Bond: Involuntary Celibate. Seriously, Ellusionist, have you never seen a James Bond movie? He doesn’t use joy-buzzers and a squirting corsage to take down the enemy. Admittedly, that would make a cool movie. An owner of a prank shop who has to use the items in his store to take on the men who have kidnapped his daughter or something? I may have to write that.

In response to SansMinds pen, Ellusionist writes this in their ad:

Screen Shot 2018-10-07 at 9.37.40 PM.png

“Many will imitate Pyro, some will even try to sell off our back through their product naming tactics... but there's no mistaking originality, quality or presence. [Ed. Note: Presence? WTF?]

Coca-cola needs store brand cola to show people why it's #1. [It does?] In that same vein, Ellusionist vows to pursue the quality and safety of it's [its] innovations for decades to come... no expense spared.

As the old saying goes, if you pay peanuts, you get monkeys.”

Yeah, that’s not what that “old saying” means. If it was about the quality of goods you receive, then paying peanuts and getting monkeys would be a great deal for the guy who gets monkeys. The saying applies to employers (not customers). It means that if you don’t offer a good salary, you’ll get poor workers. It has nothing to do with what the person is writing about in the ad. (Other than the fact that Ellusionist is unwilling to pay someone to write their ad-copy and, in turn, they get this junk cranked out by one of their in-house monkeys.)

They also write:

The PYRO Pen itself has been designed to contour to your palm like any other marker…

Ah, yes, just what I look for in a marker: that it contours to my palm. “Like any other marker”? Hey, Ellusionist, you know how markers work, right? Your palm shouldn’t be involved. Although that does explain something about who is writing their ad copy. I’ve always thought, “This seems like it was written by a dumb child or a smart gorilla.” And those are the only groups that hold writing implements in the palms of their hands.

Untitled 2.jpg