Mailbag #143

Announcement

• If you downloaded the shortcut in last Thursday’s post, download it again. It’s been updated to fix a bug and to handle single digits.

How the hell did you lose the FISM award you were up for? 😆 You can say that didn’t bother you, but given the things you were up against, it has to gnaw at you.—CB

Well, I’m sure shitting on the awards the moment they were announced didn’t help. I also asked not to be considered. And as far as I know, none of the judges even follow the site.

But no, it didn’t “gnaw” at me. You have to understand, I feel zero connection to the broader magic world. I don’t resonate with what’s happening at FISM, at the Magic Castle, on message boards, or in most magic-related spaces. The style of magic and the skills they value are almost the opposite of what I care about.

I’ve long felt out of step with magicians. I used to chalk it up to magicians being dull dorks, but I don’t really believe that anymore. I think, as people, magicians are as interesting (or uninteresting) as any other group.

It’s really just the way most of them approach magic that I don’t vibe with at all. A five-minute ring and string routine? The cups and balls? A 20-minute card set that no one remembers any specific details of the next day? What’s the point?

If a trick doesn’t give people a story to tell or serve as a way to connect with others, I have no interest in it.

I recognize the skill and artistry that’s celebrated in places like FISM. It’s just not what I’m personally into.

I know there are people out there whose interest is much wider than my own, and they can appreciate this site as well as more traditional styles of magic. But I don’t have that ability. I only have a narrow focus of interest when it comes to magic, and it’s pretty much the stuff I write about here.

So it doesn’t bother me not to have won. It wouldn’t have registered with me in any meaningful way. I’m glad someone who cared more about it got it.

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Here’s some feedback from recent posts that present some further options/info that you might find worthwhile, but don’t really need a response from me

I really like your “Fencing” concept. I’ve actually been using a similar idea in a few tricks without realizing it. One of the best examples of “Fencing” I can think of is a subtlety from Max Maven: In most Gilbreath tricks, you have to cut the deck into two piles and ask the spectator to do a riffle shuffle—which can feel a bit unnatural. What Max did was cut the deck and begin a riffle shuffle himself, saying, “Let’s shuffle the cards.” Then he paused mid-shuffle and added, “Or better yet, you shuffle the cards,” as he split the packets and moved them toward the spectator. 

It reminded me a bit of a concept from Darwin Ortiz called “False Progression”. It’s when a method is so fooling that you can repeat it multiple times. So to make the trick have a crescendo and not be boring, you start under seemingly worse conditions in the first phase,  then slightly better in the second phase and for the third phase you perform it using the full potential of the method.

There are tons of “Bi-Reveals” in magic literature. I had always thought of them as just multiple outs, but your distinction makes perfect sense—and they really are stronger than standard multiple outs. One of the most curious “Poly-Reveals” I’ve come across is in The Purloined Letters from The Essential Stewart James. In it, a poem by Edgar Allan Poe reveals three different cards:

The seven of clubs is revealed by taking the first letter in the first line, the second letter in the second line, and so on, to the twelfth letter in the twelfth line. The four of spades is revealed by taking the first letter in the last line, the second letter in the second-last line, and so on, to the twelfth letter in the first line. The five of hearts is revealed by taking the first letter in each line commencing with the last line and reading up. —GD

I really liked your post from yesterday: The Box: Grocery Delivery. The Damsel List Force is a really fantastic idea and I'll definitely been using it.

But I mostly wanted to suggest that you talk to Marc Kerstein and Albert Chang about this being added as an official feature to DFBX. I think being able to use this force with DFBX's input methods would take it to the next level. —AO

I reached out to Marc and he may have something planned that will work similarly in a forthcoming update to DFBX.

You’re on a generational run with your recent posts. Bi-Reveals, Fencing, Phantom Hits, and the Box are all things I would have expected you to save for your books.

One Bi-Reveal I’m surprised you didn’t mention is the “Switch” feature in the Jerx App. When sitting across from someone I will make my prediction then lean the phone against something on the table so it faces me. I’ll do a trick that whittles down their options to two, followed by a clearly free choice. Then by having them join me on my side of the table or having them take the phone and look at it themselves, I can control what outcome they see without touching anything. So clean. —GM

Dustings #12

Florian K writes:

The forward thinking on the Savant Deck is indeed genius, however it is not original to Craig, Lloyd and Murphy‘s. Without proper credit being given, this is directly lifted from the Dani DaOrtiz Penguin release „The Ritual“. Here the master gives a detailed explanation of his original „Psilology of Numbers“ concept.

I hope the parties involved can work out a satisfactory solution.

How dare you come to my site and attack Craig Petty like that. Craig can’t release anything without someone hopping online to call it unoriginal or stupid.

Well, let me tell you… this premise:

“I do product packaging design for Murphy’s Magic. Also, I’m an idiot who can’t spell due to the brain power I need for incredible mathematical feats.”

is vastly different from this premise:

“I do video editing for Penguin Magic. Also, I’m an idiot who can’t spell, but that’s because I use my awesome brain power instead to place your chosen card at your chosen number.”

These are totally different premises. Get off your high horse.

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Speaking of Craig Petty, he released a video tearing into Yigal Mesika that you may enjoy.

I haven’t watched it (it’s three hours, I have a life to lead), but if you like magic drama, there seems to be a lot here. (Although I have a feeling it probably didn’t need to be longer than The Godfather.)

I, too, tackled Yigal’s over-litigiousness more briefly (unless you’re a remarkably slow reader) back in 2016 with this post.

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Hate Justin Flom as much as you like. (In fact, hate him even more than that, I don’t care.) But putting these shitty old tricks in this narrative structure is the only thing that makes them close to watchable…

The Box: Grocery Delivery

I have a new tool to share with you today. But first, let’s put it in the context of a trick.

This is an expansion of an older trick I’ve written up somewhere before, but with some new tools and techniques involved.

Imagine

My friend Nataliya is visiting my apartment for a Taskmaster marathon.

At one point, I move some things on the coffee table and uncover a business card.

“Oh,” I say, pausing the TV, “you’ll find this fascinating. Wait… do I have one left?”

I turn the card over to show four checked boxes and on unchecked one.

“Okay, yeah I do. So, this is a grocery delivery service start-up that I’m part of the beta testing team for. It’s not like the typical grocery delivery service, because they only do one item at a time. But they do it in a kind of crazy way.”

I rub my chin. “Let me think what do I want…”

“Actually, I’ll let you choose. We’ll do it randomly, so you know it’s legit. We’ll pick something off my grocery list. I probably have 50 or 60 things on there—so let’s just say 50. Name a number between 1 and 50.”

She says 22.

I pick up my phone and open the list. “Okay, we’ll go with the 22nd item. Actually, I’ll give you some leeway—you can choose the 22nd item, the one above it, or the one below it.”

The 22nd item is beef jerky. Above it: granola. Below it: lentil soup.

“We can go with the item you chose. Or we can make it totally random—flip a coin to go up or down. Or just flip a coin in your head and tell me which one you land on. I’m harping on this because you’re going to think it’s some kind of trick. But clearly, everything on this list is different. If you’d picked a different number, you’d have landed on something else entirely, and different options.”

Eventually, she settles on the can of lentil soup.

“Here’s where it gets weird,” I say, leading her into the kitchen.

“This service delivers whatever single item you’re thinking of… right into the breadbox.”

I slide the card into the breadbox.

“It takes about a minute,” I say.

We awkwardly wait that minute out.

“Okay, check,” I tell her.

She opens the breadbox and pulls out two things:

A can of lentil soup.

And The Box delivery card—now with all five boxes checked on the back. (Sadly making the moment unrepeatable.)

Note

Keep this in mind…

1. The number is freely named.

2. The grocery list is a real note in your real Notes app.

3. The choice between items is free.

4. There is nothing else in the breadbox. Nothing is loaded into it at any point (other than sliding the card in).

5. They can open every cupboard, the oven, the microwave, or anything else in your kitchen and not find a single other thing from the list anywhere else.

Method

Here are some of the techniques used to make this so strong.

Fencing

As discussed in yesterday’s post, we’re using a technique called Fencing—framing the conditions as more limiting than they actually are. Then, when we loosen those conditions just a little, it feels like real freedom, even though the outcome is still tightly controlled.

I start by implying I’m the one who will decide what to use the card for. Then I "concede" some control by letting them choose a random number. From there, I open it up even further: they can choose the item at that number, the one above, or the one below

This is clearly not as free as letting them just think of anything you can get in a grocery store. But it’s significantly more fair than what I initially lead them to believe which is that I’m going to be the one who chooses something “at random.”

Bi-Reveals

As I wrote about last week, Bi-Reveals let you force two (or more) items, giving them a free choice at the end, while still allowing you to name or imply the reveal location in advance. That’s what gives the reveal its power because it feels like you’re committed from the start.

In this case, the implication comes from the name of the delivery service: The Box Grocery Delivery.

So when the chosen item shows up in the breadbox—the only thing in the kitchen actually called a “box”—it makes perfect sense.

If she’d picked the granola, I would’ve taken her outside to show her how the service works: you drop the card in the mailbox and wait a minute

This too is perfectly logical. It’s The Box grocery delivery service. Things are delivered to your mailBOX. What could be more clear?

If she had picked beef jerky, I would have walked her over to my front door. On a table next to the door is a small cardboard box. I would drop the card on top of the box, wait a minute, then tell her to open it.

Again, a fully logical reveal tied right into the name of the delivery service.

And in no circumstance do the other locations occur to someone. If I reach into my pocket to reveal something, it naturally occurs to people to wonder what’s in my other pockets. But if something appears in the breadbox, no one’s thinking, “Hmm, but what’s in the mailbox?” The other locations don’t even register as options.

And the sealed box near the front door draws no attention to itself. It just looks like a random piece of mail on a table near the front door, where people keep pieces of mail.

You might be thinking, “I don’t have a breadbox,” or even, “I don’t have a mailbox.” I get it. But you’ll figure something out. The real point here isn’t the props—it’s the structure. And more specifically, it’s the tool I want to show you…

The Damsel List Force

“Damsel” forcing is a term I use for a type of force that contains elements of clear, unequivocal, free choices.

The Damsel List Force is a Shortcut you can put on your iPhone. When run, it prompts you to enter a number. Once you do, it creates a grocery list in your actual Notes app, with one item at the selected number, and two other force items just above and below it

(You obviously wouldn’t have a big solo button on your screen for this. That was just for the demonstration.)

This tool works particularly well with Bi-Reveals. If you have two potential options, you say, “Name any number, but before you do, I don’t want you to think, ‘Oh, everyone must name the same number.’ So name a number to decide a postilion on the list, and then we’ll flip a coin to decide if we go one up or one down from there. That way, no one can say for sure what we’ll end up on.”

If you’ve got three reveals, you can do what I did: let them stick with the one they “chose,” or allow a coin flip (real or imagined) to shift it up or down.

The shortcut was created by supporter Albert Chang, and can be found in the resources below. It’s currently set up for this trick, but it’s well annotated and easy to adapt for other routines.

You’ll need to figure out your own preferred way to trigger the shortcut, but otherwise, it’s ready to go.

Wrap Up

That’s it.

The only other detail is how the final checkbox gets marked off on the card. I just switch the card early on, swapping the one with four checked boxes for one with all five at any point when they’re not paying attention. After the switch, the card sits on the table, face-up. The other side is out-of-mind until the end, when the final box appears checked (and now you have a rationale for not doing it again).

Thanks again to Albert for creating the shortcut and letting me share it here.

Resources

Damsel List Force shortcut

Box logo

Printable business card pdf — For use with cards like these, which are pretty good for creating fake little businesses and institutions for magic premises.)

Fencing

I’ve got something very cool to share with you tomorrow. The routine I’m transcribing for it draws on a lot of techniques I’ve introduced before, and one new idea I want to talk about today.

In magic, methods almost always come with some kind of limitation:

• The spectator can’t shuffle.

• They have to write down the word they’re thinking of.

• The magician has to use his own coins.

• The mind-reading only works from a limited list of options.

And we—rightly—assume these limitations will draw suspicion.

But this technique goes a long way toward diffusing that suspicion entirely.

Imagine we have a trick where the deck can be cut, but it can’t be shuffled by the spectator.

Typically, you might say something like, “We need three random cards. So cut the deck anywhere you want, and we’ll take the next three cards.”

That feels somewhat fair. But they might be thinking:
“Does he know what cards are where in the deck?”
“Why are we taking three cards right next to each other?”
“Why can’t I just spread the deck and grab any three?”

Now, I’m not suggesting they’ll consciously think these fully-formed thoughts. But I do think if you say “we need three random cards” and then you do anything other than let them dig through the deck to pluck out three cards at random, then something about the process will feel more restrictive to them than necessary.

And that is the feeling we want to eliminate: the sense that what they’re experiencing is somehow more controlled or narrow than expected.

So how do we do that?

Like this:

“Okay, we need three random cards, so I’m going to cut to a random spot in the deck…”
[You carefully cut the deck at a particular point.]
“…and we’ll take the next three cards.”

Pause. At this point, the spectator is likely thinking: He probably knows where certain cards are in the deck. That’s why he cut them so carefully. I doubt these are really random cards.

Then you say: “Wait… actually, you cut the deck. As many times as you like. I’ll turn my back.”

When they’re done, you turn back around.

“Great—we’ll use the three cards from wherever you stopped.”

You see?

We established a baseline: I, the magician, will carefully cut the cards to a specific point myself and pull out three cards.

Then we gave them something that feels significantly more fair: Actually, you cut the deck as much or as little as you want, and then we’ll take the three cards from where you cut.

Taken alone, that second procedure might feel a bit controlled. But in contrast to what came before, it feels open, generous, and fair.

The emotional trajectory shifts. Instead of: “This feels less free than I expected,”
they’re thinking: “Oh… this is actually more fair than I thought it would be.”

That’s the technique: Establish tighter-than-necessary restrictions… then loosen them.

How else might we use this technique?

One

“I want you to think of either a cat, a dog, or a mouse. Got one?”

Hmm… a one-in-three guess isn’t that impressive.

“Actually… wait. Let’s make it harder. Think of a farm animal. Any animal you might find on a farm.”

Two

“Place the word you wrote face-down in my hand.”

Ah… he’s probably going to try to peek at what I wrote.

“Actually, let’s place it in my wallet instead. That way I can still hold onto it, but there’s no chance I could accidentally glimpse it.”

Three

“I want you to turn to…let me think…uhm… how about page 70. Go to page 70 in that book and look at the first word on the page.”

Huh… I wouldn’t be surprised if he already knows the word on page 70.

“Actually, let’s use this other book you chose to select a completely random page. I’ll flip through it, and you just say stop anywhere.”

Make sense?

Having them think of only a farm animal, having them place the business card in your wallet, having them choose a random page in a book by you flipping through a different book… those are all restrictions imposed by the method.

But by first creating tighter, unnecessary restrictions, then pulling back to the real ones, we generate a feeling of increased freedom.

The end result feels more open and more fair, even though it's still guided by the same underlying constraints.

This is such a crazy powerful technique. And when I hit on techniques like this, I always think, “Well, I can’t possibly be the first person to codify this.” If this idea is lying around in some magic theory book, let me know so I can properly credit it.

For now, I’m calling it Fencing.

That’s based on the Jewish concept of building a fence around the law, where you intentionally add extra rules or restrictions, not because they’re necessary, but to ensure you don’t even come close to breaking the actual rule.

Here we’re sort of flipping that concept. We create an unnecessary restriction… and then remove it. And that shift—from strict to less strict—is what we’re using to create the illusion of fairness.

First Time/Every Time

This might be obvious, but it's worth mentioning since I’ve had a couple of people email me about it recently.

In my latest newsletter, I shared a trick where your friend cuts to a card in the deck, and then you show them a folder on your phone full of photos of other people, all holding the same card after doing the same cut.

The question I was asked was how I can reconcile a presentation like that (or something like The Protection Spell) with the point I’ve often made that tricks are the strongest when they feel like they are something you are discovering with the your audience for the first time.

It depends on the nature of the trick.

If the trick is built around a big idea—“Let’s go back in time two weeks,” or “They say this incantation can summon spirits”—then I think it’s strongest when it feels like something you’ve never tried before. You’re exploring it together, uncertain of the outcome.

But when the premise is small (a 50/50 choice, or a single-card prediction, for example) it can become stronger by implying this is something that’s been happening repeatedly for some reason. You don’t have to repeat it in front of them. Just show some lingering evidence—a photo folder, a tic sheet, a journal—that this thing keeps happening to everyone.

“I know what card you’ll pick.” Okay, fine.

But:

“I know what card you’ll pick... because everyone around me has picked it ever since I had this prophetic dream.” That’s a much more meaty premise.

That ongoing pattern is the big idea. It’s what makes the trick worth showing.

Mailbag #142

I made this post in a magic group on Facebook and I’m not sure why I expected people to engage with it honestly but the comments are just full of magicians coping saying things like “I perform at the annual Engineer banquet every year and they love it” or saying that smart people are usually more fooled by magic. And a lot of them are just saying I need to get better at magic if this is my experience.

But this is something I’ve had trouble reconciling for years. There are clearly a lot of very intelligent and creative people who create and perform magic. But the only people who seem to enjoy watching magic tend to be not very smart. I just can’t imagine someone genuinely intelligent paying $60 to see Penn and Teller like I did the other week.

It’s like being someone who works on “The Kardashians”. I’m sure the people behind that show are incredibly talented people who work in television but ultimately they’re making a show that appeals to the lowest common denominator of society.

And this has kind of been true of magic for years. For a long time it was just considered a form of “juggling” and was a street performance. Kinda similar to those silver robot guys. Robert-Houdin brought it to the stage but I’d argue the target audience never really changed.

What do you think? Is there a way to make magic more appealing to intelligent people or are we playing a losing game and doomed to only perform for people who would eat crayons. —AO

In my experience, I haven’t noticed a strong correlation between intelligence and people’s enjoyment of magic.

That said, I don’t perform for random crowds. I perform for people in my social circle. And most of the people I choose to spend time with are smart, funny, interesting people. And I’ve naturally evolved material that appeals to them.

Now, if you’re asking whether a generic trick off Ellusionist is more likely to appeal to a dumb person? Yeah, probably.

There are a couple reasons for that:

1. Most magicians are bad. Dumb people are more easily entertained by bad art.

2. Magic can make people feel stupid. Dumb people are used to feeling stupid (some would say it’s the defining trait of being dumb). Smart people are uncomfortable feeling that way.

But I’ve never had trouble getting smart people to enjoy magic—so long as I’m doing something genuinely fun, rooted in a good premise, and not giving off a “look how clever I am” vibe.

Look to your own email for proof that it can be done. I can’t speak to what Penn & Teller are doing in Vegas these days, but back in the ’80s, they were darlings of the art-house scene in New York—getting 10,000-word profiles in The New Yorker. Now, sure, after eleven seasons of a TV show designed for mass appeal and a long-running Vegas residency aimed at tourists and families, the current show may not feel especially cerebral. But what were you expecting? If you're looking for entertainment aimed at intelligent people, don’t go to a city erected atop a foundation of bad math and human stupidity.

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Do you know any worthwhile facebook magic groups? Anything that replaces the Cafe since that’s a non-factor these days?—SD

I don’t have a Facebook account myself, so I’ve only seen the magic groups there by browsing through friends’ accounts.

Personally, I haven’t found any that seem particularly helpful. The most useful ones tend to be focused on a specific product or app. But Facebook isn’t built to organize or preserve information, so even when there is a valuable post, it usually gets buried under years of low-effort noise.

I’m sure the DFB group has some great posts. But every time I visit, I’m drowning in things like: “Look, it’s Superman holding a Coca-Cola can! This would be a great DFB reveal!” Would it? Really?

The general-purpose magic groups are usually even worse. It’s hard for any group to be worthwhile when its primary goal is just size. A Facebook group with a dozen smart, handpicked members could be great. But once you’ve got thousands of people, it devolves fast.

At that point, the posts are mostly:

• People with something to sell, or

• Enthusiastic beginners with special needs asking how to get their head unstuck from a Square Circle.

These groups often pretend to be “magicians only,” but the entry requirements usually amount to a question like:

On their heads, magicians traditionally wore a Top ___?
A) Hat
B) Cat
C) Fat
D) Bat

So yeah, maybe there are some obscure Facebook groups out there trading genuinely valuable ideas. But if they exist, I don’t know about them, and they probably want nothing to do with you.

Dustings #127

This is an incredible bit of forward thinking by Murphy’s Magic, Craig Petty, and Lloyd Barnes in their new Savant Deck release.

I grew up in an era when magic tricks came in a Ziploc bag, so it’s genuinely heartening to see this much thought go into the packaging.

Here’s how you use it in performance:

You casually leave the box out on your coffee table. Your friend spots it and asks, “What’s this?”

“Oh,” you say, “I’ve been dabbling in packaging design lately. Just a side hustle to make some extra cash. That’s one I worked on.”

They look closer. “Uhm… you spelled ‘calculations’ wrong.”

“Yes, I know. I’m actually a complete fucking idiot when it comes to spelling. It’s a neurological trade-off. My brain forfeited basic language skills in exchange for extraordinary mathematical ability. Here—let me show you…”

And boom! You’re right into the Savant Deck.

“Amazing!” your friend exclaims. “So your brilliant math skills are only possible because your brain compensated by gutting your spelling abilities. Fascinating! This must also be why you lack emotional intelligence and any sense of charisma: your brain wants to be able to add card values quickly.”

Thanks to Murphy’s, Craig, and Lloyd for all the thought they put into this presentational prop. A lot of magicians will just think it’s a typo. Guys… do you really think they would misspell a word right on the front of the product packaging? One of only eight words that appear there? That’s ridiculous. It wasn’t a mistake at all. It was actually calulated.

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Speaking of thoughtfully crafted things, Jeff H. directs me to Scott Robinson’s website, author of the book, Pure Imagination, which Vanishing Inc was recently pushing.

I adore the attention and care that went into this website.

For example, I love this beautifully written, completely not generic, paragraph. Clearly penned by an actual human about a real, specific magic book that they read and enjoyed.

Pair that with a picture that so lovingly shows what real playing cards actually look like, and you truly have a site that touches the heart and mind.

There’s only one upsetting part of this site, and that’s in the endorsement section. For God’s sake, Penn Jillette and David Copperfield, quit it with the surgery and the botox. Just grow old gracefully.

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For those of you with the most recent book, a new video has been added to the appendix that’s worth checking out.