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Good day Guys and Girls,

Who’s up for an armchair challenge? Got thinking about this when driving the other day. Imagine a scenario where you are taken from the comfort of your living room and dropped into a town several hundred miles away from home. Sounds weird so far? Worse still you have only GB£5 or EURO 6 or US/CAN$ 7 in your pocket.

Your mission, if you choose to accept it Jim, is to put together a magic show/event using only this amount of money. You need to raise enough money to allow you to live in that town for a few days or buy an airline ticket home. You can do this through the medium of busking, bar magic, restaurant, etc. You obviously have other life skills but this is something of a survival challenge where you rely upon your magic skill and knowledge supplemented by the most basic of essentials.

It may also be that you do not require ANY props whatsoever.

Now you MAY have access to basic materials: in Ireland and the UK for example, you can get pens and billets by visiting bookies such as Paddy Power, Ladbrokes, William Hill and nicking some. Or pencils in Argos. If you can find free stuff, all the better.
I’ll start the ball rolling; in a local Poundshop, I picked up 3 decks of cards for €1.49. Diary cost €2. Packet of envelopes, €1.50. Sticky tape: €1 and set of dice €1. My routine based on this:

BANKNIGHT – using envelopes. Necessary gimmick can be made from torn up envelope (sorry magic dealers). Since I have no cash for the opening performance, I’m gonna have to use an IOU as the main prize. All in good fun.

ONE AHEAD – using paper billets/torn envelopes. Dice roll as one of the predictions and 1089 as force.

TOSSED OUT DECK – utilising one deck in Si Stebbins or 8 Kings stack. Could borrow some rubber bands in local hotel or shop, if needed but can get around this.

CATACLYSM – another deck used for this

CHRONOLOGUE – using “Diary cost €2” item above.

Gonna get at least 20-30 minutes out of that lot. It’s more parlour than close up. Would like to find/procure some visible rope for professor’s nightmare but that’s it essentially.

What would your props/show look like?

An interesting concept, I believe both Max Maven and Paul Harris have published works based on starting from scratch with virtually no resources. Of course, to be on the safe side we have to say that rather than nicking anything from Argos, Paddy Power etc it would be better to ask politely if they will 'donate' them to you I remember being in McDonald's once with a fellow magi who need some of those wooden coffee stirrer sticks. He asked the manager if he could have a few and instead of being told to take a handful, the guy gave him a whole boxful, around a thousand! Of course, most of the basic items, cards, pads, pencils etc can be borrowed so the cost is even less and relies only on the performer's knowledge and ingenuity.

a jump into the corner shop for a deck of cards and some sweets and mints and I'm good to go.
thing is, right now, I don't think I'd be able to walk into my local shop and pull it off
but if it was that i was dumped in a random city somewhere the motivation to get home might be enough
motivation is the key


on the subject in my college / uni days we were very poor and used to play a game of pulling a "no walleter" which would involve going for a night out without your wallet!
The rules were essentially that you can't just borrow money or get your mates to pay you along.
The hardest part was often getting home at the end of it all

I could buy a deck of cards, a sponge (to be cut up for sponge balls), and a pocket hanky in a pound shop. That gives me two euros change. So now I can do: Cards across, six card repeat, sponge ball routine, balls over the head, five minutes with a pocket hanky, and a simple miser's dream. With a biro I can turn my hand into an impromptu puppet. There is an hour long kids show right there.

Or buy a deck of cards, a note pad, and some envelopes. I can do a forty minute busk with that.

Or buy nothing and do Q&A and readings, and make the big money.

You can often find Tarot cards in the Works for under £5, if I can find a branch then I'd probably by a deck and go for readings. If I can't get the cards then palm readings would be my next option.

I'd go to the pound shop and buy a pair of stockings (£1), a box of tissues (50p), a roll of tape (50p), some plastic cups (50p), a small knife (£1), and a piece of fruit (40p). Leaving me with one pound ten pence.

I'd then go to an internet cafe and use the £1 to send an email to my mother along the lines of; MUM HELP ME! I've been kidnapped, robbed and dropped off in a strange city. I know it's in England but other than that I've no clue, I'll be waiting on the corner of 'Queen street' and 'Dundas street', but I don't know what city that is. I have no more money and no means of contact. Please call the police and send me help, NOT A JOKE!

Then I'd go out in the street use one of the stockings to make I.T., the tissue and tape to make some balls. I'd then use the 10p to perform the floating coin to build a crowd, then do the cups and balls with the paper cups and tissue finishing with a fruit reveal and then end on a basic 'borrowed note to fruit.'

If help doesn't arrive and I'm unable to get the crowd needed to make enough money I will then use the second stocking as a mask and rob a local shop with the knife, chances are good I'll get caught, but at least then the police will offer me room and board for the next couple of days.

Lady of Mystery wrote:You can often find Tarot cards in the Works for under £5, if I can find a branch then I'd probably by a deck and go for readings. If I can't get the cards then palm readings would be my next option.

I was thinking that, a few quid for a coffee and palm readings in the cafe all day. Borrow a pen and paper and there's numerology too.

I could buy myself a chicken burger at Mcdonald's for 99p. I don't do magic when hungry . Using the coins in my change, four pieces of card torn from the burger box, and a napkin, a coin production and matrix can be performed. More napkins would provide all required for a large, comedy torn+restored routine followed by a sort of sponge ball type routine. My shoelaces could be cut up into the parts for a professors nightmare routine. With a little thought I imagine that would be enough for a short busking set.