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Is there any such thing as cheating when doing a magic trick? or is it all about the effect, no matter how it's achieved.

I'm undecided but magic is all about tricking people but at the same time I can't help thinking that if you have a marked deck of cards and it's spotted then the magician would be accused of cheating. So if a marked deck is cheating then you could say the same for any altered deck, many of which have featured on TV.

Is using a stooge cheating? I think many people would think it was but again I've seen some tricks on TV that have used many stooges. When pen and teller revealed the truck running over Teller trick you could say it involved about 50 stooges stood on the other side of the street and pretending to be amazed when in fact they could see what was really going on. Or the vanishing Elephant that was surrounded by people.

What do you guys think

It's ALL about the effect, in my opinion, not the method. As long as the method is robust, it's just personal preference.

I think using camera tricks and stooges like Dynamo and Angel do is cheating and taking it too far.

Instant stooging for something like the electric chairs I would say isn't cheating.

It's your own morals and the only way to go is instinct I think.

Magic is cheating for heaven's sakes. Unless it really is possible to saw somebody in half. Don't sweat it.

themagicwand wrote:Magic is cheating for heaven's sakes. Unless it really is possible to saw somebody in half. Don't sweat it.

Exactly. I could get tired of people saying so-and-so did it "wrong". It doesn't matter as long as it entertains. Even a screw up will entertain if you handle it well, but ONLY if you make it entertaining. Paul Daniels tells a story on his Carpool episode of the finale of a big show going wrong. He had the curtains closed, sat at the edge of the stage, explained what had happened, got big laughs and the show ended to the sounds of an audience mad for more. That's because he turned a screw up into entertainment.

Angel's camera tricks are frowned upon because you feel cheated at being able to catch him out, rather than entertained. Supposing we never knew he used them and there was no suspicion at all that he did?

Tomo wrote:Angel's camera tricks are frowned upon because you feel cheated at being able to catch him out, rather than entertained. Supposing we never knew he used them and there was no suspicion at all that he did?

I don't feel cheated because I can catch him out. I feel cheated because it is a camera trick.

I get the argument, and agree with it to an extent, that effect is everything.

Maybe if Angel wasn't such a douche I wouldn't mind so much, but he is and I do.

I guess when there is such a plethora of 'good' methods to achieve an effect, when one relies on a camera trick, or stooges, it is just lazy, uninspiring and, well, douchey.

molesworth wrote:
Maybe if Angel wasn't such a douche I wouldn't mind so much, but he is and I do.

Can't argue with that.

allll down to personal preference, as Tomo said. Personally i wouldn't ever use stooges (except maaaaybe instant stooging, for some reason it seems more okay to me as long as its all done in front of the audience) and don't even like the idea of using a marked deck, I'm sure any effect that can be done with a marked deck can also be done (maybe with a little more work and an extra step) with a normal deck. Having said that I use an ID all the time. What's really annoying is when the spec accuses me of using a marked deck and i try to tell them its not and they dont believe me i even try to SHOW them its not a marked deck and they STILL don't believe me. fml.

So basically, there is little or no logic behind what i think is okay and what i don't. But i think as long as you feel comfortable then its all gravy.
Also, camera tricks: NO NO NO.

I think if you use a camera trick you can't call yourself a magician. I do not have any appreciation of guys like Blaine who use blatant camera tricks. They are not magicians.

I know it's almost certainly not the kind of trickery anyone is referring too , but I loved the Camera trick stuff David Nixon did in the 70's.

I think that as long as your audience come away entertained, you've done your job. I've got no problem with using the occasional stooge if they help an effect, I wouldn't ever base an effect 100% around a stooge but I have used them to give things a gentle nudge in the right direction.

For an excellent display of how stooges can be used, there's a great Brendan Burns standup comedy DVD called "So I Suppose This Is Offensive Now". It's so unexpected that when the subterfuge is revealed, you don't feel cheated. You just think "You clever so-and-so!".

What's really annoying is when the spec accuses me of using a marked deck and i try to tell them its not and they dont believe me i even try to SHOW them its not a marked deck and they STILL don't believe me. fml.

When I was first starting out, I did something super simple: I did a slop shuffle for my brother. He reckoned it was a gaff deck.

BradH wrote:

What's really annoying is when the spec accuses me of using a marked deck and i try to tell them its not and they dont believe me i even try to SHOW them its not a marked deck and they STILL don't believe me. fml.

When I was first starting out, I did something super simple: I did a slop shuffle for my brother. He reckoned it was a gaff deck.

I wouldn't try to convince them that they're wrong, some people would take that as a little confrontational and you may well end up with them being even more difficult. I've heard all sorts of different explainations for how I do things, most of them wrong. I just smile and move on to something else that can't possibly use the method that they've guessed. If you find that someone is convinced that the only reason that you know their card is because you've got a marked deck, put the cards away and just have them picture a card in their mind. Then see if they can explain how you knew what that thought of card was

I wouldn't try to convince them that they're wrong

I think I said something at the time because we'd just been playing with the deck, so he should have known it wasn't gaffed!

Since then, I never try and correct them. Some of the "explanations" I've heard for the ID are hilarious.