Tricks – Page 72 – MagicShow.Tips

Pickle Matrix…

One of the things that I love about magic jams is having people improve on your ideas. I had an idea of doing a trick with a hamburger. I’d make 4 pickles disappear and one at a time, they’d reappear under the bun. I mentioned that and the idea quickly grew to “what if you did a matrix with pickles under the bun“.

That idea is way better than what my idea started out as. I’m super lucky to have the magic jam partners that I do have. Today I started playing with the idea. I cut some circle of cardboard to be the hamburger and some cardboard to be the pickles.

I kinda got the sequence worked out, but the trick still needs some work. Mostly it needs to be built into an actual hamburger. This is something that would be better for a social media video than a live show. It’s fun to do, and I can’t wait to actually record it!

Nut Production…

Ever since I was a teenager I’ve been fascinated Don Alan doing his giant nut production. What’s cool about a giant nut, is that it’s a simple object, there’s not much to it. It’s basically a big chunk of metal that you make appear.

Here’s Don doing the nut production:

Now let’s fast forward to a few days ago, a non magician friend of mine posted a picture of a couple of giant nuts he saw at his parent’s antique shop. I gave them a call, made a deal, then drove 90 mins each way to pick them up!

These things are massive! They also need some love, so today I started cleaning them up. Here’s a side by side comparison of one that that’s in the process of being cleaned and the other that hasn’t:

I’ve got an idea for the routine that I will do. It’s going to be a transposition of different colored metal nuts from under a hat. Then a walnut will appear and inside that walnut will be a signed silk (that was used earlier in the show) and end with the production of the giant nut. We’ll see if that works out, but it’s my idea for now.

Fan Art…

It always amazes me that some of the magic tricks that I create end up featured in other magician’s shows. Recently someone posted a picture that their kid drew of them doing a virtual magic show.

The trick that the kid decided to feature was my Snake Wand Surprise! This is a gag that has a magical production of a dozen spring snakes at the end. It’s a lot of fun to do, and something that had sat in a notebook for years before I finally made one. Then a few years after I had started using it myself, I started selling them and it was an instant hit!

I just want to say “THANKS” to any magician that uses anything I’ve invented!

Even More Ring On Rubber Band

Last week I started working on a routine for the Ring on Rubber Band trick. I learned that my initial opening line didn’t play how I wanted it to. I added in a line at the beginning that’s was in a routine I used to do in the show, but don’t do anymore. It kinda works as an opening line, however it really doesn’t answer the “why am I showing you this” question.

“I’ve performed this trick across America, including it’s minor outlying territories, Guam, Puerto Rico and Canada. The ring represents the 18 years I’ve been married and the a rubber band which memorializes the one time I bought broccoli …just to let it rot in the crisper”

Show ring and rubber band. The rubber band is around your left index and thumb. Point to the sides of the rubber band as you say:

“This rubber band has two sides, just like congress…the Senate and the deep state. And this ring also has two sides, a left and a my wife is always right side.”

“The ring will go through each side of the rubber band defying the restraining order I got from the laws of physics.”

Push the ring through the first side of the rubber band

“Through one side, that’s the easy side. It’s the bunny slope of the rubber band. The second side is the most difficult, it’s the Mount Everest of Magic. Three men have died trying this next part, but they all had preexisting conditions…and latex allergies.”

Push the ring through the second side of the rubber band.

“Like Coachella, we’ll take it off one band at a time.”

Pull the ring off the rubber band one side at a time.

“and that’s how I wrote my wedding off on my taxes!”

I also added in a joke about the ring having sides which is a tag on the first joke. The routine is starting to take shape. The current sequence of moves I’m doing makes the routine feel more like filler to me, than a solid, good routine. It’s still lacking a punctuation on the ending.

Unseen Kicker…

Lately, I’m trying to be better at directed practicing. This is working on something specific, versus just playing around with palms, or whatever. Last night I was I was practicing the Quad-Triumph that I posted about recently. Basically this is a Triumph type card effect that uses four shuffles instead of the traditional single shuffle.

One thing that hit me was that at the end there could be a subtle kicker. Right now the cards start in a mixed order and they end in a mixed order. If they ended in a known order, that would add a layer to the trick. Ideally that known order would be new deck order.

Last night I was able to figure out how to get the cards into an order that was one half red and the other half black and the end. Unfortunately this little touch will largely go unnoticed as it happens at the same time as the cards all facing the same direction. It’s one of the those things that if a magician see it, it will add to the effect to them. It’s the little things, things that don’t need to be there and won’t be seen by most people are what makes something art.

This is visually pretty good, and definitely takes the trick a step further. It’s a good compromise for now, but I have a feeling I’ll be working more to figure out how to get it into new deck order.

Cutting a Joke…

Last night I popped into a virtual magic club meeting and got to try out the Ring on Rubber Band routine that I’ve been working on. I was kinda surprised at the reaction the opening joke got. Here’s the opening joke:

“This is the most expensive trick I do. The rubber band cost me 37 cents, but the ring cost me half of everything I own.“

The reaction was an “oooh” and not a laugh. I think the problem is the background that I’m projecting onto the line is different from what the audience is projecting. The audience I think is assuming that I’m getting divorced or am divorced and it’s not a good split. What I’m saying is in the state I live in, because I’m married, my wife automatically owns half of everything that I own.

Is the joke worth trying to save?

Probably not. There’s a lot of background info that I would need to provide, or I’d have to figure out a tag or follow up joke to explain better that I’m still happily married.

I think I’m going to try to come up with a new opening line…

More Ring on Rubber Band…

Continuing the last few days work on to the hopefully have a working Ring on Rubber Band trick, I’ve tweaked some of the jokes a little bit. I changed some of the punchlines and streamlined the script to tighten it up.

“This is the most expensive trick I do. The rubber band cost me 37 cents, but the ring cost me half of everything I own. The ring represents the 18 years I’ve been married and the a rubber band which memorializes the one time I bought broccoli …just to let it rot in the crisper”

Show ring and rubber band. The rubber band is around your left index and thumb. Point to the sides of the rubber band as you say:

“This rubber band has two sides, just like congress…the Senate and the deep state.”

“The ring will go through each side of the rubber band defying the restraining order I got from the laws of physics.”

Push the ring through the first side of the rubber band

“Through one side, that’s the easy side. It’s the bunny slope of the rubber band. The second side is the most difficult, it’s the Mount Everest of Magic. Three men have died trying this next part, but they all had preexisting conditions…and latex allergies.”

Push the ring through the second side of the rubber band.

“Like Coachella, we’ll take it off one band at a time.”

Pull the ring off the rubber band one side at a time.

“and that’s how I wrote my wedding off on my taxes!”

The script is a bit better. I’m not happy with the the “Coachella” line between the on and off phases. Right now that’s a place holder for something better.

The hard thing about right now with COVID restrictions is that I can’t just go out to a bar and try it out and get feedback from real people. The trying and tweaking phase is much clunkier and time consuming.

Routining The Writing…

The last couple of days I’ve been writing about putting together a script for the Ring on Rubber Band trick that I’ve been working on. Yesterday I wrote a bunch of jokes, and today I’m going to try to put them together in some sort of a logical way.

“Through one side…that’s the easy side. It’s the bunny slope of the rubber band. The second side is the double black diamond. Three men have died trying this next part, but they all had preexisting conditions… and latex allergies.”

Push the ring through the second side of the rubber band.

Pull the ring off the rubber band one side at a time.

“and that’s how I wrote my wedding off on my taxes!”

Alright the routine looks like more of a routine now, and not a bunch of random jokes. The routine now runs about a minute. That’s way better than the 12-15 seconds before I started writing for it.

The jokes still need some tweaking. The congress joke needs a better punchline, and the double black diamond needs a better word/name in its place. I also need something in between the the two penetration phases, where the ring is over both sides of the rubber band, but before I pull it off.

Writing for Ring and Rubber Band…

In yesterday’s blog post I started writing about putting together a script for the Ring on Rubber Band routine that I’m working on. We’re really starting at nothing and trying to come up with something to say, otherwise the routine is 12 seconds long.

Let’s start by making some associations to the props.

Ring:
-wedding
-fashion
-circle
-gold
-marriage
-expensive
-cheap

Rubber Band
-office supply
-latex (or not latex)
-holds things together
-yellow (or whatever color it is)
-rubber band gun
-circle
-snap

Using that list, how about I introduce the props by saying, “a ring which represents the 18 years I’ve been married and the a rubber band which memorializes the one time I bought broccoli (asparagus?)” I think I prefer saying “bought broccoli” as the alliteration sound funnier in my head.

Let’s keep writing and see what comes up:

“Just like congress, this rubber band has two sides, a left side and tea party”

“I will push the ring through each side of the rubber band defying the restraining order from the laws of physics.”

“This trick is even more dangerous once you know that I have a latex allergy.”

“The best part is that I can write off my wedding on my taxes”

“The rubber band will jump through the ring like a tiger through a flaming hoop in the circus”

“Through one side…that’s the easy side. It’s the bunny slope of the rubber band. The second side is the double black diamond. Three men have died trying this, but they all had latex allergies.”

“Beyonce’s favorite trick”
Do the hand dance move from the Put a Ring on it Song

“This is probably the most expensive trick I do. The rubber band cost me 37 cents, but the ring cost me half of everything I own.”

“I tried to do this with the governor’s ring, but they escorted me out saying I had to have an appointment”

“I showed this trick to Pete Rose and when I told him what was going to happen he said, “I BET you can’t do that”…”

For the quick little writing session, I wrote down everything I thought of. I didn’t censor any ideas because I thought they were bad. Bad ideas may lead to a good idea, so they stay. Obviously I won’t use all of the jokes and I’ll have to arrange them into an order that makes sense. That’s a job for tomorrow.