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Hi All

I am making some moves to turn 'pro' with my mentalism, and looking for earning opportunities. So here's my question.

Is there really much of a market for restaurant magic and/or mentalism? Personally, I have never seen a restaurant advertising magicians, or eaten in one where one has been performing - but I often read that working in restaurants is a potential earner for magicians.

Any thoughts? Anyone here do much restaurant work?

Many thanks

James

There's a market for restaurant magic and I've seen quite a few in my time but I've never seen a restaurant mentalist.

Personally, I don't think that table mentalism works.

Theres deffinately a market for restaurant magic - most of my work is restaurants, but ive never heard of a restaurant mentalist. Im not sure how a mentalist at the table would work either. What you need to remember is that people to to a restaurant for one main reason - to eat! When doing magic at tables, you need to be able to do quick fire effects, that arent too drawn out, as food can arrive whilst your mid-flow and as soon as the food arrives to have to wrap up the performance because the last thing you want is for the food to get cold. With mentalism, a lot more time would be involved, and a lot higher concentration level. If the waiter arrived at the table your performing at whilst your mid routine, could you honestly wrap up your menatlism routine there and then?


I hope this helps out a bit

Mark

I specialized in this venue for years (magic, not mentalism) and will tell you that there is a great market for it...it is all in the pitching of it to the venue. I am not sure about mentalism, however I would happily give you any advice I can on how I made it work for me. It is still my favourite setting to do, even after progressing to bigger venues, stage, etc.

PM me anytime

Hi All

Thanks for the replies! Mark, when you say "quick fire", how quick is that?

I have some quicker 'mind-magic' bits I could do, but nothing that is just a few seconds.

Regarding mentalism in dinning settings, I found this video of Mark Cairnes.

http://www.markcairns.co.uk/video.htm

This is a wedding, but is there any reason why restaurant should be different from a wedding setting? (I honestly don't know).

And Moodini, I would love to know more about pitching!

Thanks again

James

Weddings are different to restaurant magic with good reason.

For a start, the majority of people at a wedding reception WANT to be entertained and are very much open to magic, even if they claim to have not liked watching magic in the past.

As Mark has said earlier, people go to a restaurant to eat and for some, it's a bit of a bonus if there is also a magician there. You may still get a lot of people who say no - I'm not interested when approached in a restaurant.

Tie is definately on your side at a wedding reception for performing.

James Lovecraft wrote:Mark, when you say "quick fire", how quick is that?

Personally my recommendation for a walk around a restaurant is like the Ambitious Card. My reason being that its lots of little phases, and you can stop the routine at any point. You dont want to be doing long drawn out routines. Maybe my longest routine at table is a minute, if that gives some help to you


Mark

I would just back up the opinons already wxpressed on here, partiularly by Mark. In a restaurant scenario you have to be raedy to pack up and go at a moments notice if the food arrives.

No drawn out routines are ever safe. I walk the restaurant constantly looking for suitable tables to approach. And still I get some wrong. I approached a table just today only to find that they were just waiting for their bill and were about to leave ( I still got 3 tricks in before they left!).

Most of the mentalist stuff I know takes time and atmosphere, you don't have this luxury (in my experience) in a restaurant. I border on the mentalist work with some standard tricks. I present the ID as a mind reading experiment for example. But I usually use this as a way of arousing interest, not as a theme to my whole performance.

Don't know if this helps.

A couple other good points on the "material" you present as well....it is vital that you are flexible with your routines/material in a restaurant due to the ever changing and evolving enviornment you are working in.

Not only do you need to leave one table because their food is arriving, but you may have gotten a cue from the serving staff that one of their other tables has a service delay (messed up order, slow kitchen night, large group and need time to put all food together) and they will want you to slide over to them ASAP....so subtley wrapping up one table to instantly begin another is huge in that venue.

Johnny Wizz wrote:Most of the mentalist stuff I know takes time and atmosphere, you don't have this luxury (in my experience) in a restaurant.

I think you have hit the nail on the head, here. Mentalism is largely about presentation, which can be hard to do properly in a noisy, busy environment. A visually-impressive but conventional card, coin or other magic trick is probably more suitable.

I've often wondered why mentalism is regarded as unsuitable for a restaurant environment in favour of mainstream magic. Mainstream magic usually requires the use of some prop - coins, cards, ropes, sponge balls etc. - whereas a lot of mentalism requires simply the spec's mind. Rather than pulling out a rope and pair of scissors at the table-side, surely it would be easier to engage in a touch of mind-reading tom-foolery?

I don't know how to cut and restore rope, and sponge ball multiplication is the devil's work, so for me I have no choice but to get all mental.

I've been doing alot of mentalism close up recently and am finding that it's going down really well.

I guess that you do have to be a little careful what you do but there's no reason that a well though out bit of mind reading can't work in a resturant.

Mentalism doesn't have to be long and drawn out at all, I've got a couple of murder mystery routines and a mini phatom artist that I've been using for a few months now. Each easily takes less than 5 minutes and has been getting some very good reactions.

there's no reason that a well though out bit of mind reading can't work in a resturant.

Magician. I predict that sir and madam will have the smoked salmon

Diner. well HTF do you know that!

Magician. Because it's all that's left on the menu

There's a very interesting looking menu based book test in Annemann's Practical Mental Magic (I think that're where I read it but I might be wrong) that would be perfect for a little returant mentalism.