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My dad told me a story of when he was doing stand up and someone was constantly giving him a hard time. After many snide comments another spectator turned to the heckler and said 'Would you shut up. No one came to here you speak' to which my dad replied 'No one came to here you speak either.'

Everyone laughed, the audience the heckler and the man defending dad.

Don't get into a verbal spar with the heckler, it's what they want and jokes like 'You have no mind' will just encourage him to continue trying to sabotage you.

However joke like 'you want me to tell them about the S.T.D's?' could defuse the situation but only if done right, and to the right person.

Every job has something shitty about it, for performers it's instability and heckling, learn to let it roll of you and you will have the upper hand every time.

Some great suggestions here guys & gals. God bless the old faithful I.D ehh? It sure can save your ars* when you find yourself in an awkward situation.

I'm still tempted to buy Jay Sankey's Invisible DVD, with just the I.D effects on it (apparently it comes with a free I.D aswell). Currently I only use my I.D as an emergency "out" if I ever drop a break / lose a jog etc - so I can then proceed into a Do As I Do matching-reverse-reveal trick.....or sometimes I occasionally use it for a psychologically dressed-up version of John Archer's Dodeckadeal (great trick)

But I must admit, I'm loving the lines about the STD appointment card, and needeing glasses to read such a tiny mind. Quality! I also like the point about the human mind not being able to just think of 'only one' thing at a time. Very true indeed....after all, it's virtually impossible to make your mind completely blank. The harder you try to think of nothing, the more things seem to pop into your head.

Good tips all round here I feel. Many thanks for your input. Please keep posting any other intresting effects, presentational patter or psychological tit-bits that you've used in the past. It's always great to hear stories of how we've all had to proverbially 'rise to the occasion', and had to pull something special out of the bag when under pressure.

Just a quick thought that is completely untested by me, but how about a duel meaning statement such as looking at them for a second in silence then saying something along the lines of "that's not a very nice thought". They're causing you hassle so it's not unlikely that they might be thinking something less than favourable. If they are thinking something like that then you'll get a reaction from them which everybody will see. If they're thinking something completely different then your statement has not been a reading, it's been a statement either about them interupting your performance ("that's not nice to interupt me") or a comment that's a gentle put down ("the thought of reading your mind isn't very nice"). It's interpretation is all down to the situation and the spectators themselves and there's a possibility of it being a hit.
Ian

TylerMason wrote:Ahh, the blissfull ignorance of the sceptical layman....

How many times have you been performing close-up, and wandered into a card based mentalism piece (a force followed by a psudeo body-language reading etc)....and low and behold, some smart ars* pipes up and comes out with that classic line.....

"Go on then, im thinking of a card, read my mind!"

....no matter how many times I hear it, I can't help but crack a sly smile. First of all, it either means your doing your job properly, and they really believe in your skills to the point of having to "test" you.

OR

They're "testing" you in order to de-bunk your attempts to happily entertain them for free (ungratefull gits!) Anyway, my question is this:

I was doing table hoping last night, and as inevitable as the tides, I got "tested" again. So ,which effects do you use (whenever needed) to put the Heckler's in their place, or even what kind of witty patter do you employ to answer their statement of "Go on then, read my mind"

Hmmm... sounds like you need to stop doing Card Tricks under the ruse of being "psychic" or "psychologically skilled" (I detest magicians that do exactly what you describe and think it "mentalism").

I'm not kidding when I (repeat myself) bring out how this is one of the reasons why you don't mix magic tricks with mentalism; it costs you the ability to establish rapport -- the investment from your patrons that disarms the skeptical and give you the upper hand; that is, if you are striving to deliver some solid psychic-styled entertainment vs. approaching mentalism as a magician doing tricks.

As to "handling" a heckler I have several methods but the approach tends to be the same; "I appreciate your skepticism but you must understand that it is impossible to "read someone's mind" that is a misnomer. What I do is a combination of things that have been proven clinically, to aid in creating the seeming ability to pluck specific thoughts that someone is focused on as well as a kind of character analysis based on body type, body language and so forth. But given your particular case, let's try something, one on one..."

A spiel along these lines, prefacing your come-back, will help disarm the heckler and bend him/her more towards your will and position of advantage. From this point you want to get them directly involved but you DO NOT want them to write anything down, not do you want to follow with yet another card trick -- that would be their "out". This leaves you with routines along the lines of Psychological Forces, Progressive Anagrams, Swami/Pocket Writing techniques, or Muscle Reading/Pendulum demonstrations.

When I can I will deliberately create a situation that leads them to feel that either they or one of the others at the table, are picking up on thoughts rather than my self. I prefer doing that anyhow, in that it takes the heat off of me and tends to prevent this sort of confrontation.

As to specific effects I can't give any personal recommendations in that what works for me may not work for you. This being due to both, personality differences and experience levels. So you need to find bits, based on what I and others have shared, that "fit" who you are and how you prefer to present yourself.

My dad once had a heckler when he was singing, the guy yeld out 'You're a '****' my dad said 'yeah so are you but I'm the one getting paid tonight' the guy shut up and sat down the crowd went crazy, he was playing a regular place where he had a good following.

Anyway in that situation I'd go into a lie detector test, that bit can work really well and if it doesn't just explain that you and the spec aren't in Raport right now