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hey mental people, i am looking to put together a few mentalism routines for a close up situation and wondering what i could do. i have a number of mentalism effect but feel i should mix it up for variety. for example a prediction effect, then possibly a telekineses effect, thought projection and so forth. any ideas would be well recieved. cheers.

Andy

In the name of God don't make it long winded. And don't worry too much if they think it is the real thing or not. Just try to entertain them. The main thing is to make the plot so simple that they can actually follow the effect. Most mentalists are so convoluted that by the time the trick has finished people forget what the beginning was.
The fact that they talk too much doesn't help either.

I have always said that mentalism is the best type of magic if it is done well and the worst type if it is done badly. Since it is usually done badly be careful..................

I agree. Solid hard hitting yet easy to follow is the way with evrything magi!! or mentali !!

Research ya favourite mentalists, think why they are your favourites, then find similar roles you can do whilst injecting your own spirit and charcter to it!

thanks for the advice guys, i am certain richard osterlind also said this on his dvds somewhere. keep it simle i shall

Be yourself. Be believeable.

Nobody really believes in hocus-pocus, and remember—you're offering entertainment as a MENTALIST, and not a MEDIUM.

i reckon some people DO believe in hocus pocus, apparently 41% of people nowadays believe in some form of E.S.P....

Geist is a very good book, and touches upon some very interesting stats about beliefs...as well some very strong effects and methods....

By hocus pocus, I meant "And now, I'll wave my magic wand and make your thoughts disappear".

I would agree that people believe in ESP etc. but I'd be surprised if anyone going to see an entertainer would believe they had the ability.

ah! who waves their wand in public nowadays i wonder..or should i say wand-er...probably not...

Well, so much for pointing the guy in the right direction...

Yes, you want to be yourself, you want to have fun and you most certainly don't want to be long winded (which is the biggest down fall of most who try thier hand at this or bizarre magick).

No, you shouldn't be mixing mentalism with magic tricks, but you're going to do it anyway and the bulk of the less experienced (and more commercial) will say, "it don't matter..."

I'm a firm believer in having and holding to a theme. For instance, if you can bend forks & spoons it is doubtful that you are predicting the headlines... that is, if you were a real psychic that simply isn't the case. At the risk of repeating myself (and something that's been preached in this craft for decades now) you want to look at what you're doing and ask "How would a real Psychic do this?"

I can assure you, they don't have you do something as ignorant as write down a thought and then instantly tear up the slip you wrote it on... that's a magic trick (that can be used as a clever technique under certain circumstances -- seen Bruce Berstien's or my own notes on the subject)

Real Psychic's rarely display more than one primary gift in their younger years (teens into late 20s) though a secondary skill may start becoming more pronounced (at rudimentary levels) as they mature along with a tritiera ability. Most of the time these new abilities are but refinements of the first. Understand however, that innate ability differs from learnt skills; learning to be a dowser for instance, is a skill that can be cultivated in persons that show strong intuitive or empathic abilities. You wouldn't want to attempt this course of study with someone that had pronounced PK ability in that they might inadvertently make the pendulum or dowser's yoke move vs. the flow energy...
... yes, I'm taking a wide side track here, but this is how the public understands this stuff; the people that read about and study the paranormal vs. the more cynical attitudes of the magic world. As Cassidy points out, you want to be believable and to do this you must present material that is logical, practical, viable and plausible.

So think things through and find the logical path that delivers to YOU as the presenter of said mysteries, the greatest psychological advantage and thus, the greater control over the mind of your witnesses. Magic is presented with the knowing that it is a trick. Mentalism on the other hand invokes belief and investment from the patron... the two conflict with one another when it comes to the psychological approach of presentation as well as operation. Those refusing to see and respect that difference are merely fooling themselves and seeking to exploit the present wave of the craft's popularity and/or commercialism.

As usual, the formidable Mr Browning takes a rather 'deeper than necessary' stance on the subject

The initial post merely asked what opinions on a short 'string' of routines.

As said, the keys here are:

1. Keep it simple
2. If you're mixing magic & mentalism—keep it all credible. There's no harm whatsoever in mixing the two genres for entertainment purposes—currently there's a huge trend of magic/mentalism hybrids, so go with it!
By credible, I mean, try to avoid jumping from a pure sleight of hand effect such as Ambitious Card or Coin Matrix straight into a spoon bend or divination... it just won't flow.
3. Think carefully about the structure of your whole performance. Always imagine yourself as the spectator and walk through the performance whilst trying to look 'in from the outside.'

I particularly love the line from Mark Lewis:

The fact that they talk too much doesn't help either.

it all depends on your style, and why you can do what you do...

the why defines the what (my personal opinion only)...which counts for nothing ultimately, but is a suggestion at least...

In the Devil's Picturebook, Derren Brown says he had no problem with some straight forward card magic, then move onto the stronger stuff, i think he says (along the lines of) "as long as you give it all enough space, people will accept it..."

i do think the difference between American mentalism and UK mentalism is quite vast though the more i read and watch...but thats another topic all together...Osterlind and especially the crowd reactions vs Derren's is in my opinion vastly different...

Abraxus, sometimes you speak more sense in one paragraph than it would be deemed possible. Good post

blimey...think i'll take a screenshot and frame it then...

EDIT: without starting yet another pointless argument, i would like to put this question out there...

Would a real psychic "perform" in the first place? Wouldn't they do a little more than entertainment?

It would be a bit of a show-off psychic that read the name of someone in a crowd of people wouldn't it? Wouldn't they do a bit more than that - and for the greater good too?

I don't think they would "perform", i've not seen any advertised ever...or rather, a real one wouldnt want an "for entertainment purposes only" adendum at the end of their shows surely...

so it's all entertainment at the end of the day, whether it be a freaky, eeire and weerd performance, all the better...it's acting, story-telling and all kinds of manipulations...

I know that this is intellectually light weight but I will chuck in an experience I had. I was at a barbecue back in the summer and as usual it was expected that I would get out my cards and do a few tricks (my friends and family have gone past the bored with it stage to the got anything new John? stage). So I did a few bits of sleight of hand magic and then got out my Beyond ESP deck. And with my sister in law as the victim did the dead simple "you lay a card face down then I will" and of course matched them all up.

Because this deck is totally examinable I let people handle them as a discussion ensued as to how I had done it. All through the trick I had done a lay your card and then look at me act, reading her mind. I obviouly stuck with this and bent the discussion around to NLP and people being influenced by others behaviour. By the end of the discussion I really think people believed that I had influenced the choice of cards being laid.

Now, this is in the context of family and friends and a few glasses of red wine and it is at the bottom end of mentalism. But it really shook me afterwards that a group of people could convince themselves that I had special powers or abilities! Oh, and it took the heat right off the trick and the deck!

abraxus wrote:blimey...think i'll take a screenshot and frame it then...

EDIT: without starting yet another pointless argument, i would like to put this question out there...

Would a real psychic "perform" in the first place? Wouldn't they do a little more than entertainment?

It would be a bit of a show-off psychic that read the name of someone in a crowd of people wouldn't it? Wouldn't they do a bit more than that - and for the greater good too?

I don't think they would "perform", i've not seen any advertised ever...or rather, a real one wouldnt want an "for entertainment purposes only" adendum at the end of their shows surely...

so it's all entertainment at the end of the day, whether it be a freaky, eeire and weerd performance, all the better...it's acting, story-telling and all kinds of manipulations...

Stop showing off

Fantastic, once more.