talkmagic.co.uk

Antera wrote:The CD thing was the worst thing i ever saw.

You didn't see Avatar then.

Grimshaw wrote:

Antera wrote:The CD thing was the worst thing i ever saw.

You didn't see Avatar then.

Or anything with James Cordon in it...

Lord Freddie wrote:

Grimshaw wrote:

Antera wrote:The CD thing was the worst thing i ever saw.

You didn't see Avatar then.

Or anything with James Cordon in it...

Nothing is worse than anything with James Cordon in it!

Everything about that CD thing was wrong. My farts could do better magic. And they do. They can clear a room within seconds.

I didn't think the CD act was terrible but I thought it an odd choice for a show where you're trying to fool masters of the field.

I know nothing of stage magic so when acts like High Jinx and Young & Strange are on I think "Wow! Even with a budget I don't know how you could do that - apart from paying someone to tell you" but with the CD act I was already working out how I would do it by the halfway mark.

I can hazard a guess that everyone who claims the CD trick was bad hasn't got the faintest idea of the method. It's damn clever!

Remember, it was not a case of figuring out how to do it, P&T had to work out how it was done.

The method could be the most clever method in the world, but I can think of a really easy way to do it and I'm sure most of the people watching did as well.

You could do the most sophisticated card force in the world, but unless you show the audience that all the cards are different before you start, the audience will always jump to the easiest conclusion and stick to it.

The problem with the CD trick is that the trick is presented as 5 cd players with all the wires tucked away, no visible speakers, etc. So there's a hundred very simple explainations and it doesn't matter how clever the actual method was, we just think of the easiest, and shout "next!"

The format of the show is not to figure out how it *could* be done but how it *was* done so actually it *does* matter how clever the method was.

This is, of course, not how it works in the real world but in the context of the TV show, it matters.

Then if you did an ambitious card routine full of triple lifts instead of double lifts, and they guessed doubles, would that count as winning? I think it wrong to do a routine that has about 50 different methods and if they happen to say the wrong one, "win".

I think the point of this show is not only original routines, but entertaining ones as well.

As well as getting past the producers in the initial filming process...

...not that there is any hard feelings there .....

Jon Allen wrote:I can hazard a guess that everyone who claims the CD trick was bad hasn't got the faintest idea of the method. It's damn clever!

Remember, it was not a case of figuring out how to do it, P&T had to work out how it was done.

It doesn't matter about the method. I didn't enjoy it. Even if that was real magic I would still be bored.

The song titles should have been told before he went around predicting them, just all seemed a bit dull.

Beardy wrote:Then if you did an ambitious card routine full of triple lifts instead of double lifts, and they guessed doubles, would that count as winning? I think it wrong to do a routine that has about 50 different methods and if they happen to say the wrong one, "win".

Very true.

Alan was going to do his A act on the show - a very funny trick with balloons http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5up1fI-Veaw

However, due to a howl up involving Johnny Thompson & Penn & Teller immediately before the filming of the pilot/special, he couldn't get to do this trick either on the special or the series.

The CD trick was something he came up with for the show to fool them and it DID FOOL THEM. They didn't know the method. He rose to the challenge and fooled them. However, although Penn & Teller had set the challenge and set the prize, they didn't set any clear rules on what constituted fooling them. On the evening of the filming, they did not get anywhere near his method.

September Films have edited the show to make it look like they caught him out and that he was using electronics/MP3 players etc but he wasn't. The actual course of events has been misrepresented.

Post the airing of the show Penn has claimed that they weren't "emotionally fooled" - a very ambiguous and grey area. Remember they only begrudgingly admitted that John Archer and Ben Earl fooled them in the first show and that for Ben's trick they filmed the part saying that he had fooled them back in Vegas. Were they "emotionally fooled" by them?

Penn has also said that he "hates formal rules and competitions". However, it was a rule set in place for the show that prohibited him from doing his balloon trick. Kind of ironic.

To those people who say there are hundreds of methods - there aren't. You could use electronics, MP3 players, switch wires, have sound coming out of a different place BUT THAT'S IT. However, Alan didn't use any of these. He used a clever, straightforward method that they didn't guess.

I love "Fool Us" and am very happy it's on TV but as a competition is completely and utterly flawed.

To get on to the show you have to have a trick that is either very novel (eg. Ali Cook) or has a good chance of fooling them (eg. Matthieu Bich) - Alan has more entertaining tricks that he could have done but the production company wanted him to do something with a chance of fooling them, and he did. The fact that Johnny Thompson didn't step in during the filming to point out that P&T did not know the method and the way that September Films have edited the show in my opinion means that Alan was completely screwed by the process.

I wrote more on this on my website and posted it last weekend if you haven't seen it:

http://www.rob-james.com/foolus.html

An interesting post, sir.

I would argue though, that in a show with the format of Fool Us, it would be remarkably difficult to create and adhere to any strict rules.

Not least because although Penn and Teller have exposed many tricks in the past, I get the idea they're also sensitive to working magicians who have a need to keep their best material secret. Some tricks are exposed, and others are not. I can't pretend to know why this is the case, but I use it as an example of a show that contains a great many grey areas.

I think there is a need for people to be lenient when it comes to the working out of tricks. You say I palmed the card when really I copped it. Who wins? Is copping a form of palming? Who says? The finer details could go on forever, and would make for a very boring show.

You say P & T didn't work out Alan Hudson's trick, and you're in a much better place than I to say that. I do think it odd however, that Mr. Hudson didn't fight his case a bit more. Ben Earl certainly seemed to, and he ended up in Vegas.

There's different ways to do Earl's trick, there's different ways to do Archer's trick, and I'm still confused as to why that older chap got to perform two tricks when others only got one.

So I concur that the show is a bit scrappy, and if it is a competition, then hard and fast rules would seem to be a necessity. If you know Alan Hudson personally, you'd be excused for maintaining that the whole thing was unfair, as you have a greater connection to it than me or Johnny Punchclock sat watching it at home.

I'd put it to you though, that regardless of the rules and fair play in the competition, you instead concentrate on an excellent point you made at the beginning of your blog post. That it is the most important magic show on British TV for a decade. If you chance upon the Theory 11 web site, you'll see a bunch of young magicians hugely upset that they can't get ITV in their country, and they're all eager to see this show. They're envious, and can't wait for P & T to bring it back to the states. Clips from the show are posted on web sites and talked over. Its a great thing for magic. I imagine a great many of us on this site got interested in magic through the Paul Daniels Magic Show. I believe Fool Us can have the same impact on bored kids watching at home. That nagging feeling of "I've GOT to be able to do that" may well come through for some of them, and their lives won't be the same again.

Anyone worth their onions should know that 'reality tv' is anything but. If real life was so damn interesting there'd be no need to make shows about it. Producers and executives stick their oar in for whatever reason in the name of entertainment, and if Alan Hudson was stiffed I feel sorry for him. He did, however, get one huge piece of free advertising and can now carry his name with the tag line 'As seen on Fool Us!'.
So every cloud, and all that.

It's a strange one this. I think that from the magicians point of view, you have to treat the show as publicity, both for the artists featured and the art of magic itself.

Magic hasn't been on TV for a long time, and it's great to see so many people talking about this show. I still believe that the exposure isn't a problem, because Magicians know it anyway and Laypeople either forget, don't care enough to remember in the first place, or google it, get interested and start practicing with a deck of cards. That's how I started, and I'm sure that applies to a lot of you here.

But how can you actually, genuinely fool Penn and Teller?

Think of the last trick you saw that genuinely amazed you. Could you have puzzled it out? What if you were allowed to ask probing questions? Could you figure it out then? What if you could go up on the stage and examine the props? Ask questions to the magician, "Can we switch these CDs around? No? Aaaaah Gotcha!" It's NONSENSE.

If P+T like your act, you'll end up in Vegas. If not, they'll find a way to demonstrate you didn't fool them. And you know what? You should be grateful for the exposure. Piff the magic dragon may not have fooled them, but he's got 1,444 followers on twitter, and his youtube clip from the show has just hit half a million views. If he's not rich in a year, he's messed up a very great opportunity.

If you agree to go on someone elses TV show, then you have to play by their rules, whatever they are. If you don't like that, don't go on. Build up your fanbase in another way, and when you have enough followers on Twitter, ITV will be phoning you to beg you to host your own show. Then you can make up the rules and make the show you wanted.

robjames wrote:Alan was going to do his A act on the show - a very funny trick with balloons http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5up1fI-Veaw

However, due to a howl up involving Johnny Thompson & Penn & Teller immediately before the filming of the pilot/special, he couldn't get to do this trick either on the special or the series.

The CD trick was something he came up with for the show to fool them and it DID FOOL THEM. They didn't know the method. He rose to the challenge and fooled them. However, although Penn & Teller had set the challenge and set the prize, they didn't set any clear rules on what constituted fooling them. On the evening of the filming, they did not get anywhere near his method.

September Films have edited the show to make it look like they caught him out and that he was using electronics/MP3 players etc but he wasn't. The actual course of events has been misrepresented.

Post the airing of the show Penn has claimed that they weren't "emotionally fooled" - a very ambiguous and grey area. Remember they only begrudgingly admitted that John Archer and Ben Earl fooled them in the first show and that for Ben's trick they filmed the part saying that he had fooled them back in Vegas. Were they "emotionally fooled" by them?

Penn has also said that he "hates formal rules and competitions". However, it was a rule set in place for the show that prohibited him from doing his balloon trick. Kind of ironic.

To those people who say there are hundreds of methods - there aren't. You could use electronics, MP3 players, switch wires, have sound coming out of a different place BUT THAT'S IT. However, Alan didn't use any of these. He used a clever, straightforward method that they didn't guess.

I love "Fool Us" and am very happy it's on TV but as a competition is completely and utterly flawed.

To get on to the show you have to have a trick that is either very novel (eg. Ali Cook) or has a good chance of fooling them (eg. Matthieu Bich) - Alan has more entertaining tricks that he could have done but the production company wanted him to do something with a chance of fooling them, and he did. The fact that Johnny Thompson didn't step in during the filming to point out that P&T did not know the method and the way that September Films have edited the show in my opinion means that Alan was completely screwed by the process.

I wrote more on this on my website and posted it last weekend if you haven't seen it:

http://www.rob-james.com/foolus.html

It's interesting that you think the show was edited to misrepresent the discussion with Alan Hudson and P&T.

I was at that recording and although there was a lot more discussion than what was shown(about 10mins more), AH seemed happy that they hadn't been fooled. He was given ample opportunity to dispute their claims and didn't.

Isn't there an intermediary who knows how the effect is performed backstage who could get involved if there is a dispute? Again, AH felt no need to take the matter to them.

Everything that was said and that happened left me in no doubt that P&T hadn't been fooled.

Yes there was an adjudicator. Alan didn't argue too much for reasons explained in my article.