talkmagic.co.uk

Is it just me who thinks this or do others find something absolutely disgusting about having to remove a card from a magicians mouth all dripping with spit then have to open it up with ones fingertips to show the world that "yes Indeed" that is my card!!

I've been into magic for a number of years & have seen this type of effect done over & over. In my early days as a magician I thought nothing much of it. To be honest, it looked pretty cool. The card had disappeared from the pack & the magician was coughing it up from somewhere deep inside his left lung.

Last night I got to experience that same trick from a competent magicain, but found it repulsive... and If i found it repulsive, I dread to think what kind of feelings a "first time" assistant twould have. How awful it would be if they too went home with the same feelings of disgust. Their experience of the magic would be one of "horror", not entertainment.

Maybe I'm the only one that thinks this way, but if you do perform this kind of effect, please consider how it might make your spectator feel.

A) They are expected to remove a folded card from your mouth. onits own that's not too bad, because anyone could hook it out with a flick of the finger.

B) They are then expected to open it up despite the fact that it is still warm and covered in salivia. Yep, the bubbles & white frothy bits can be clearly seen.

C) They are not offered gloves or forceps to carry out this procedure with and therefore feel OBLIGED to get their fingers covered in Spit.

D) They are offered no kind of anti-bacterial wipe to clean their fingers with afterwards.

One could argue "if they feel that repulsed by it they should just walk away" Oh yeah, don't think that thought doesn't enter the head! But they don't want all the Heat of walking away accompanied by whispers & probably some mimick taking by the magician to make the situaiton already worse than it is.

Don't get me wrong. I am not against this kind of effect. I just hope that some people will take my thoughts & comment on board & use them to "Enhance" the effect & turn it from somehting which is repulsive to be a part of into something which is actually quite "interesting" to be involved in.

If you do this kind of effect, consider enhancing the effect away from a feeling of disgust by making the assistant don a pair of marigolds before the card's whereabouts has even been hinted at... This surely would heighten the drama and tention, and would probably get a laugh as the spectators train of thought is completely derailed.

Offering your spectator a pair of forceps to remove the card from your mouth with and indeed to open it up with would be perfect. They'd feel like they were now involved in some kind of surgical procedure too. A couple of forceps would cost about £5 from boots.

And there's nothing wrong with offering anti-bacterial wipes for them to use afterwards. If they feel like they've just participated in an operation, they might want to ham up & love playing the part of assistant even more because you just made them feel really special.

Hopefully the difference is clear. An assistants first time experience of this effect has turned from being one of disgust, which could very well lead to them telling everyone how disgusting it was and also undo your reputaion.... to one of them wanting to tell everyone about it and how good it was because you made them feel really special because you had made them feel like a surgeon!!!

My closing comments are: If you do this kind of effect, please remember that salivia, just like wee wee, poo poo, blood, vomit etc is just another bodily fluid which equally carries bacteria, germs, disease & infection. The most common of which to be passed through Salivia is Hepatitis.
And if you do this effect without offering any kind of sterile "prop", you may as well be asking the spectator to remove the card from out of your a**e! (language please...)

And if you do this effect without offering any kind of sterile "prop", you may as well be asking the spectator to remove the card from out of your a**e!

I've heard of having an ace in the hole, but that would give it a new meaning!

This reminds me of something Derren Brown wrote about in "Absolute Magic". He used to do a ring flight routine and the climax was the ring appearing in one of his socks.

Derren wrote that he had been so pleased with the revelation that he never stopped and wondered how the spectators might view a magician putting his foot on the table and asking the lady to fish down his sweaty sock. One day some feedback reached him and he realised it was actually quite an unpleasant thing and he dropped it.

My view is that this ties in with something I think a lot of magicians forget; it's the reaction which counts. If the revelation is great, but revolts, repels or bores a spectator, then something needs to be changed, no matter how clever, difficult or subtle the method is.

I have no problem with card to mouth routines in general, but I have to say I would find it distasteful to expect any spectator to touch the card in question at all.

Further more I see no reason for this to happen. Either the card can be removed from the mouth quite cleanly by the magician. Ie, he can show hands empty first, remove the card, unfold it and reveal it,

or, at the very least he could supply rubber gloves and/or tongs for a comedy moment. It should be added that there could be some that would even find this distasteful, and so for that reason. Why do it?

I once saw a magician who's routine culminated in a £5 to banana. The £5 note had been wrapped tightly in a piece of foil before being inserted in the banana, and as the spectactor unwrapped (peeled?) the banana to discover the foil, the magician decided as this was a particularly messy thing to handle for the spectator, he would assist my sucking off all the banana bits and then hand the now gobby piece of foil back to the spectator to unwrap.

The routine was excellent, however I believe it was spoilt by the look of disgust on the spectator face as she realised that the magician actually wanted her to not only touch the paper, but unwrap it. I believe that it made the entire audience uneasy.

Now. quite possibly, this was a clever ruse by the magician, and he may have switched the fiver with the actual borrowed one that may have been in his mouth at that time, but I still maintain that the whole effect was forgotton, and only the gross out part will be remembered.

There exists a genre of magic that seems devoted to shocking people. The likes of the twisted wrist illusion, blockhead (nails up nose), needle thru arm, even blaines ear mutilation. I totally accept this genre exists, and that some will find it entertaiing. It's not for me, but that doesn't make it any the less magical and impressive for some, so if you want to do it - then I say go for it.

But I do tend to agree with puppet man. we shouldn't actually force the spectator to handle the gore or bodily fluids (as he so elequently put it).

After all we wouldn't spit in their hand would we?, so why would we expect them to unwrap a card covered in their spit?

A great many magicians find any kind of production from the mouth to be vulgar and unnecessary. Even a mouth coil can be produced from the empty hand or somebody's ear or such. Peter Marucci feels that any production from the mouth is unacceptable.

Personally, I find a mouth coil production, from the mouth, to be acceptable. Funny thing, though, I've had ONE bad reaction to this, from an 11 or 12 year old boy in my audience. He was very vocal about the fact that giving the coil that just came out of my mouth to the birthday girl was EXTREMELY unhygenic. It really revolted the young man.

Conversley, watching a magician pull a deck of cards out of his mouth looks really, really stupid, in my opinion. Different strokes for different folks, I guess...

Mike.