The Two Week Magic Show Copyright (C) 2006 Steven Goodwin Full coverage of the magic show I did for my works Christmas party in 2006. With an untried assistant, two weeks notice, and a brand new set of tricks. You can contact me directly at .

So, the goal was to write, produce, and rehearse a 15 minute magic stage show in two weeks.

With an assistant who hadn't assisted before.

And with a stage magician who's a close-up mentalist.

My boss wanted to be sawn in half, and as the only magician in the company I was charged with making it happen. I engaged my trademarked cool and thoughtfulness to the situation, studied the possible options, considered the possibilities... and then panicked!

I wrote emails to Go Magic Go, Magic Bunny, and a few others for ideas and suggestions which took the pressure off, and gave me a few days with which to legitimize my procrastination!

It appeared quite quickly that my character would change from 'approachable mentalist' to 'humouress generalist' as this would match my natural personality more, requiring less preparation and making ad libs easier and within character. The mentalism would become mental magic, and the main material would be prop-led. The through-line was 'a show on the cheap' and I worked on combining the two necessary parts of the show:

1. Some large visual effects to warrant the use of the stage
2. Some palour or stage mentalism because it's closer to my comfort zone

The second would be more difficult, since I know a lot of close-up mentalism, but not so much for the stage. Back to Videomind! I ultimately opted for a bank night opener, but using strips that read "You are a spectator - please clap at the end of each trick" and "You are a magician - please entertain" as the payoff, instead of the more traditional bank note which wouldn't have worked with the "show on the cheap" idea. This scripting also led to an alternative show concept. Namely, "the original magician couldn't make it, and I've stepped in to help out", which provides a lead in to the effect with "I hope he's left some instructions for me."

I also adapted my 'serial killers' routine from a simple 1-in-6 card force to an almost as simple 1-in-9 force, replacing the cards with large envelopes and volunteers.

These I supplemented with short tricks and gag pieces that re-emphasized the cheapness aspect of the show, and helped establish the fun of the character through neatly scripted set pieces, necessary for me in case I drifted off character.

One of the effects I looked at, and rejected, was snowstorm in china because I wasn't happy with my handling of it, and how I could incorporate it without trying to look like David Copperfield. It would have given a good opportunity for my boss to be directly involved, however. FWIW, I was going to use this as an opener because it's big and stage-y, and would bookend a more cerebral set.

I also rejected various bottle gags (appearing, disappearing, and floating) because I saw no way of including them as skits without it looking like a trick-skit-trick-skit arrangement.

There were also several ideas my local magic dealer and I discussed when we went in to buy the sawing in half pros. He was a great source of ideas and, although we didn't use any of them, it was a valuable part of my thinking process.

Despite these omissions, I still had 7 main effects planned and reasoned.

Intro - A humouress script explaining the missing magician. The wording of the script meant I could reasonably have the text printed in front of me, and read from it. This eliminated a lot of nerves, and gave me time to establish the character. This lead to the introduction of my assistant, entering stage left.

Bank night - The papers provided unsubtle hints to the audience that they should laugh and clap, despite me being only their work colleague.

Stiff rope - A set piece with humouress, slightly adult, script. Billed as 'my first trick', from an idea I believe Dunninger used to indicate the first effect (although impressive) wasn't even the start.

Rope trick - Sawing in half with ropes using the grandma's necklace principle. This was suggested on the Bunny forum, and I used it to defuse the idea there'd be a 'sawing in half' trick in the act. They could watch the rope trick, and forget about the words "saw" and "in half" entirely until the surprise ending. (I stole this idea from the hype surrounding Star Trek II and Spock's death.)

Newspaper torn gag - Discuss the traditional "torn and restored newspaper" routine, before deciding that "since this is only a free paper I'm not wasting magic powers on it".

Newspaper prediction - Patter about the predictability of journalist's writing about computer games (since my company develops them) before a word is random chosen and predicted.

Serial killers - With 20+ nationalities present in our company, I found serial killers for most countries and selected 8 with the goofiest looking men. My photo was the 9th, and the assistant would pick a date randomly with one of them. If the volunteer happened to pick a suitable nationality, I'd draw attention to it. If not, I'd ignore it. (Since creating the trick, I found that Andy Nyman does something similar but since it was an independent creation I felt justified in using it.)

Fake ending - Set piece implying "I've run out of tricks", but after using a saw to cut open a stubborn cracker, I say "Saw - lady - saw - lady - Hmmmmm" And launch headlong into a high energy version of...

Visible sawing in half - Because the boss was paying for the prop, we ultimately went with this version. We got boxes to cover the feet and chest, and I wrote a script that explained "some versions involve the assistant hiding in one half of the box". This was timed to show my assistant visually hiding in one half. I then said "No motorized fake feet", and she pretended to put motorized fake feet through the end of the box. This double bluff would pay-off when the saw was 1/4 way through the body, and the boxes opened to reveal a genuine body.

For each effect, I made sure my boss (the insistent assistant) had only to collect people from the audience, smile, collect billets, envelopes, and do minimal work. Magically, I limited her to correctly handing me ropes for grandma's necklace, and moving in the box for the sawing in half.

Then it all changed!

We couldn't find any decent boxes for the initial production, so we dropped it. I wasn't going to buy anything else for a one-off show.

The original newspaper prediction was not a method I'd done before, but wanted to do something new to expand my repertoire. However, the method I was using wasn't working well enough to make me comfortable, so I switched to a simpler 'cut anywhere' selection method, with any large word on the line being picked.

Talking through the serial killers 1-in-9 effect in full rehearsal seemed to take ages, so I cut it down to 7. It seemed that 5 would be too short, and could be viewed as luck.

I also trimmed the script for the introduction, and re-wrote portions so that our studio manager could introduce me as the magician, instead of him introducing me, who then introduced an absent magician.

On the way to the hall we had to cut part of the routine to fit into a shorter time slot than planned. This meant losing both newspaper effects. I ultimately thought that this was for the best, as otherwise that would have meant 3 prediction effects, and 2 with a related skit preceding it that might look like tired.

Also, at the hall we realized the radio mikes I'd wanted weren't available, so I had an emergency practice tearing envelopes open, and tying knots, with one hand. My assistant also practiced at being a human mike stand. In the original plan there were no microphones, but on seeing the room, it became quite clear that my lungs were unable to project as necessary.

So - how did it go?

Surprising well, considering!

My assistant was introduced by simply walking on, which was fine. My boss, being an ex-cheerleader, provided the fun we lost by not having the magical introduction.

Bank night had one volunteer (a friend of mine) who made a joke about "I'll pick #1 like you told me" So I pattered around it, saying "I told you #3" and getting for the next volunteer by asking "what number did I ask you to pick". When they said "you didn't", I invited them up to pick their envelope. I even heard a gasp as I revealed my "magicians" slip, which I'd never had before, and was surprising considering my initial problem.

Stiff rope was straight comedy, and got the laughs I wanted.

Grandma's necklace was OK insomuch that it worked. Although the only volunteer was our secretary, with whom we'd practiced earlier in the day. I added a couple of lines to that effect, mentioning the mishaps in rehearsals, inspiring a good natured squirm and laugh. But, as a consequence of the problems, I needed to check the rope myself. This looked like I was performing a move (which I wasn't) and lessened the impact. I think I also rushed my patter here, and didn't emphasize the impossibleness of the tie.

Performing the serial killers trick with 7 envelopes went on for a while, as it was announced as the finale. But it did sag in places. This was due in part to the gaps in people opening envelopes and me running out of words to cover for _that_ many people having problems. I'd also forgotten to change the bio in the final envelope from 8 to 6 when I'd reduced the number of killers from 9 to 7. Although incongruent, the laugh and applause when my picture was revealed amongst a set of serial killers help defuse the mistake.

However, the length of the selection process was too long, as I was looking for a different person to call out numbers at each stage of the process. I thought that this would eliminate the possibility that I pre-arranged the numbers with people beforehand. I wanted a different person at each step to choose numbers, or failing that, a general shout from the audience. After all, I work with these people; making it difficult to prove no collusion was taking place when performing mental magic. When I saw a similar method used on Max Magic they sped the film up as the viewer understood the selection process, and I can understand why. I'd use two people in future to make the selections.

Furthermore, when asking for numbers, someone near the front called out '6', which I used, as someone nearer the back called out '3' (the target envelope) at the same time. This convinced people I had ignored 3 intentionally. I had to patter with "sorry I didn't hear you, we'll do 3 next time." I should have said, "Ok let's use 3 then", quickly moving off 6 so that people would believe 6 was the target, and could be therefore safely eliminated in the next round of questions. There were also cases where we (meaning both myself and the audience) couldn't remember who was supposed to be eliminating whom, because of the time delays and fuss of finding different people.

Our climax, the sawing, went well. I'd reworded the patter to mention "penetration" over "in half" because I knew we'd never separate the body, and wanted to avoid disappointment. The boxes did make it look cheap as intended, but perhaps is not the best look for it. The script made it funny, particularly when people saw the legs squash into half of the box at the start, and they believed it to be a mistake. All of those elements worked as planned, so provenance must have smiled.

I did the closing "thanks for coming" script, as the LJ did a minor light show and we left the stage. The CEO was then left to follow us with his "we've had a great year speech." Something of a tall order, he later claimed, so I guess we did something right!