A Thought Experiment: The Impersonator

Imagine this… You're on a business trip to Nashville. Your first night there you go down to a little club near the hotel you're staying at. You settle at the bar and order a drink. On the opposite end of the club is a small stage and a Taylor Swift impersonator is doing her thing. It's a fun time. There's a great energy among the small crowd. As a big fan of Taylor Swift—she's probably your favorite modern artist—you're really enjoying yourself. The singer's look and vocals are very close to the original. And since you could never shell out thousands of dollars for a seat at her concert, this is kind of a pleasant alternative.

You sit at the bar, enjoying the music and playing a game on your phone. After a couple more drinks, the place is getting more crowded, so you make your way out of the club and into the warm night air. "That was fun," you think, "I wish my town had venues like that where you could relax and enjoy a drink and some good live background music."

The next night you head back to the club. It's not as busy tonight, but there's a good country-folk trio playing.

You turn to the bartender and say, "Is the woman who was here last night a regular performer?"

"Huh?" he says.

"Does the Taylor Swift impersonator from last night come here regularly? Like every week? She's talented."

The bartender says, "There wasn't a Taylor Swift impersonator here last night."

You feel like you're losing your mind. "There definitely was. I sat here for almost an hour playing Candy Crush and listening to her last night."

The bartender looks at you quizzically. "That was Taylor Swift. She dropped in for a surprise performance to rehearse the setlist for her upcoming tour."

What are you left with after this experience? Did you see a Taylor Swift show?

Kind of, I guess. But you can't really go back and have the experience of actually having seen the show. You were half-paying attention to it—lost in your phone and your thoughts. Even if you had been paying attention the whole time, there's a difference between watching it thinking you're seeing Taylor Swift and watching it thinking you're seeing a cover artist. You didn't really have the experience of seeing Taylor Swift in an intimate setting at a small club, because you didn't know that's what was happening.

I try to keep this in mind when performing.

You can't go back and retroactively impress someone with what they saw.

I frequently see magicians playing it too cool when they perform and then having to go back to clarify what the spectator saw, and how that was better than what they remember seeing.

"No, don't you remember? I showed you my hand was empty before reaching into the bag and pulling out the egg. Yes. I swear."

"No, I dealt the packet and there were only 10 cards before I gave it to you. Do you remember? I dealt them out slowly. I said, '1, 2, 3,' and then silently counted out the rest up to 10. You weren't paying close enough attention?"

Not in those exact words. But that's the general gist.

It happens because there’s this philosophy that you shouldn't go overboard clarifying the conditions when you perform.

"Don't run when you're not being chased," they say.

"A real magician wouldn't say, 'Notice my hand is completely empty.'"

Actually, that’s exactly what a real magician would be doing. He would be making the conditions explicitly clear so you could be certain of what you were experiencing in the moment.

There is an art to this, but that art isn't about subtlety. It's about making the conditions completely clear while not undermining the surprise element.

Think back to the Nashville bar. If you'd known it was actually Taylor Swift, every moment would have been vivid, meaningful, and memorable. You would have paid attention and you would have been there.

This is what we should be trying to give our spectators: the full experience of what's happening, as it's happening—not a post-performance clarification session.