Presenting the Unbelievable

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Thinking of Tuesday’s post about the little gnome who lives in your pocket and helps you with magic tricks, today I want to give you some advice on how to deliver this kind of premise.

Next week, I’ll talk about why you might want to use premises like this. The “why” I’m going to share has been eye-opening for the people I’ve discussed it with, and I think it offers a fresh way to think about the kinds of presentations you choose. But today is about how to pull them off.

The problem with most magicians is that they just pay lip service to their premises.

Too Little

  • “I have a gnome who lives in my pocket. He likes to do a trick with me.”

  • “I’m going to show you a demonstration of fate.”

  • “The Ace of Spades is the leader card. And where it goes, the other aces follow.”

These are usually the first lines they say, and then it’s more or less forgotten about.

Some premises, like “The Ace of Spades is the leader card,” deserve to be immediately forgotten. But if you have a gnome who lives in your pocket—or you can somehow “demonstrate” fate—then it feels like you should have more to say about those things. When you don’t, you're effectively telling your audience to ignore the premise altogether. So why bring it up?

The answer is: you’re trying to get them to care. You're throwing a quick line out there to grab attention for something that would otherwise be meaningless. But that move is transparent to people and these presentational hooks are unsatisfying when you don’t commit.

Too Much

The mistake I feel some magicians make when dealing with an unbelievable premise is that they swing too far in the other direction from the “too little” approach.

Ah… but of course, few believe me when I speak of him. The gnome. The sentinel of secrets. The diminutive architect of astonishment who dwells, as fate would have it, in the left breast pocket of this humble waistcoat. His name? Irrevocably unpronounceable to those not born beneath a waxing moon in the forested cleft of Elderglen. But I call him Norbit.

I discovered him one twilight, crouched atop a discarded spoon behind the magician’s entrance at the Tucson Civic Arts Center, his eyes like twin marbles of knowing mischief, his voice but a whisper upon the wind. He spoke only one sentence: “I behold all answers.” Since that night, we have been bound—man and mythic aide—collaborators in the impossible.

Do not be fooled by his stature! While he may stand but a thimble tall, Norbit’s faculties are vast. When you, dear spectator, make your innocent selection, it is Norbit who scrambles forth—scaling your khaki plains, traversing button canyons, and leaping over the chasm of your belt—to peer discreetly over your shoulder. And then, like a shadow’s whisper, he returns to me, ascending the inner scaffolding of my trousers with breathtaking agility, to whisper your card into the curvature of my ear with a voice like damp cinnamon.

And that, my friends, is how I know.

It immediately feels like, “I am now telling you a story.” There’s a Mr. Rogers-ness to it that ends up infantilizing the people you’re performing for.

Casual/social performers in real-world, person-to-person environments—cannot afford to be theatrical. It ruins the vibe.

Just Right

The key to delivering an unbelievable premise is to talk like yourself—but like yourself in a movie where the thing you're describing is possible.

Here’s what I mean: If I really found a gnome in my house—like in actual reality—my response would be shock, fear, confusion. Even if it was a friendly gnome who wanted to help with magic tricks, I wouldn’t be able to talk about it casually. It would feel unhinged.

So I’m not saying to behave the way you truly would in that situation.

I’m saying: behave like you—the version of you that your friends and family recognize—but in a slightly different world. A world with its own logic where impossible things happen sometimes. A world where a gnome showing up is weird, but not unprocessable.

You're not aiming for realism. You're aiming for tonal authenticity within the rules of the world you’re inviting them into. It’s the world that should seem unusual. Not you.

So this is crazy. The other day—actually, I guess it was a couple weeks ago…jeez—uhm, so anyway… yeah, a couple weeks ago I go into my kitchen and there’s this little… gnome-like thing…. just sitting on my windowsill. Like this… little guy. Maybe four inches tall. Eating Tic Tacs out of the lid from an old film canister. Like it was a plate or something, I guess?

And I’m like, “What the…?” But he turned out to be pretty chill. And he likes doing magic tricks, so now we get along.

That’s how I think it’s best to set up an unbelievable premise. Not scripted. Not theatrical. Not hyperrealistic. And not something you abandon the moment the trick begins.

Just setting up the world for everyone so they can lean in and think, “Okay… now how is this going to play out.”