I’m working on an idea for a card trick that would be done on the stage…or at least not in a close up context. It uses two banks of cards that are duplicates, however in the course of the trick, they could get mixed up a little bit and I’ll need to sort them for reset.
The cards don’t need to be in a specific order other than the two banks being separate, so the simple solution to sorting them after the trick is marking one half. With these cards being used onstage and never handled by the audience, I can get pretty bold with the marks.
In the picture above I just took a red pen and colored in the face of the birds on half of the cards. After the trick it only takes a few seconds to sort them using the Green Angle Separation move to get the top and bottom halves separated.
Last week I was at an event an MC’d one of their shows. When I’m an MC, my goal is to keep the show moving and not do time myself…but to be memorable. This is different from the advice I frequently be hear which is, “an MC should be invisible.” I think the MC should be the host at the party, and you should know the host if you’re attending the party!
When I MC, I have an opening warm up bit, a few bits for emergencies, and notes, lots of notes. I have the introduction for the act and ideas for jokes based on watching video or my past experience with their act. Then during their act I will write jokes based on what I see.
As I use up a note or joke, I crumble it up and leave it on the table.
The reason I leave them on the table is sometimes I need to reference something I’ve written before. By leaving a messy table, it gives me access to everything I’ve written.
At the end of the show, I have a table of crumpled up papers. I really enjoy working as an MC, however it’s a lot of work compared to just being an act in the show.
I think the key is to not make the show about you, but at the same time it’s your show!
I’m trying to carry less stuff with me when I’m on the road with my show. I used to carry a powerbank, USB micro cord, lightning cord and a USB wall adapter. I use this to plug in the show’s iphone that I run my music off of.
Recently someone showed me a powerbank that has the wall adapter and cords built in!
The nice thing is everything folds into the power bank, so I’ve eliminated carrying two cord and a wall adapter. I’m a fan of this, simplifying what I carry to it’s more direct to set up and strike the show. Sure eliminating two cords and a wall adapter isn’t much…but it’s less to haul.
Yesterday I posted a video of my vanishing and reappearing lit match. There’s not too much to the gimmick, you just need a thumb tip, match pull and some glue.
I used Yigal Mesika’s Perfect Lite match pull, but I’m going to assume that pretty much any one would work.
Glue the match pull to the back of the thumb tip and the rest should be self explanatory.
I’m trying to find a solution for a way to reveal a card that’s been selected by the audience. Essentially this is a free choice, so I need multiple outs. In the past I’ve used several ideas, like limiting the choice, or things like an invisible deck. I’m not sure I like the previous things that I’ve tried. I remembered that Marc Oberon put out a “Any Card in Wallet” trick called Bang On a while ago and found one.
I was aware of the method and I think this may work for me. The big problem is that it uses a poker size playing card, so it’s small. I think the trick needs projection to work on stage, and there’s really not a way to make it physically larger as the card needs to fit in a wallet.
I’m going to play with this a bit, as it may get me a bit closer to the solution that I’m looking for.
Walking around the area where the cruise ships dock in Sydney, Australia, there are a good amount of street performers. Lots of ambient, music acts and a couple of them were cultural acts. I’ll talk a bit more about the acts in a bit, however the thing I noticed was all the acts with amplified sound used the Roland Street Cube EX. That’s the same one I use for my street show PA, so I guess I’m part of the “cool kids”.
One of the first acts we came across was this kid who was playing guitar. The sign he has in his case says that he’s deaf and he’s actually playing.
I’m not a guitar player, but to my untrained eye, his hands didn’t really match up with the sound. I could totally be wrong, but if I’m right, it’s a solid hustle!
Then there was this guy with the drum.
For the little while we watched him, he didn’t really do anything remarkable. I’m sure that he’s great, and that’s simply based on his sign boating about how many social media followers he has.
That’s the take away, signage is a lot more important now to busking than it was when I was a teenager and did it for money.
Then there were two cultural acts. The first one was just guy singing and making music.
It was really an ambient act with no engagement with people (that I saw).
However the second one was a group and the guy had some showman ship flair!
Of all the acts I saw, he was the only one that built a crowd. He did little talks and call and response things, like “we call this a ____…everyone say ____” and talked to the audience.
With a big cruise ship in town and it unloading and loading passengers, doing something cultural is smart. Ship passengers want to feel like they’re learning about where they’re visiting, and I think this was the act that connect with the audience the most because of that.
Also, while I’m not knocking the other cultural act that was using a percussion instrument, I’d bet 90% of the tourists want to see the digeridoo. Sure there’s a lot more to aboriginal culture, but honestly are you busking to teach people or make money? Yes, you can still teach people and if that’s in your heart, you absolutely should do what’s authentic to yourself and goals. However if you’re going to try to convince people to give you money, you need to figure out how to deliver that message in a way that will reach them (and their wallets).
The other day I saw Phil Cass‘s show, and kinda briefly mentioned his shell game routine. Phil’s routine on his VHS tape in the late 1990’s was part of what got me going with the shell game when I first got serious about it.
Here’s the trailer for Phil’s video:
It’s always great to meet people who have had some influence on what you do and how you do it…it’s also a bonus when they are cool people!
It was great hanging out with Phil and Phillipa Cass while we were on the ship! The shell game video is still available from phil, you can get it at: https://www.philcass.com/shop/
If you’re into the shell game, it’s worth checking out! -Louie
Last night we watched the production show on the Cruise Ship we’re on vacation on. It’s essentially a dance show with some singing, but the whoever wrote/designed the show decided to highlight the tech over the people. While not an always bad choice, for me (and I’m biased as I make my living as a live performer) watching special effects on a screen gets old…especially when you have talented humans on the stage.
There was a lot of the time they had dancers doing their thing in the dark while the screens overpowered them.
I totally understand what they were going for, which was a high tech show. I think there were ways to do it, like simply lighting the live performers while still keeping their futuristic theme.
Then at then end something strange happened. The cruise director came out (which is normal) and mentioned that the six moving screens cost a million dollars each, so six million total. It was, as my wife said, “a strange flex“, where he was giving props to a robot. For six million dollars, you could have an insanely amazing show with minimal tech! In my view, the cruise director trivialized the humans in the show. A better thing to say would have been something like, “let’s not forget a round of applause for the million dollar robot screens…and another round of applause for the cast of Pixel’s Cabaret that came from 7 different countries and 3 continents to entertain you.” He’d still get to brag about how much the TV’s cost, but also honor the performers. Without them, I don’t think anyone would watch the 40 minute show of just flashing lights.
Look at your show, is the technology overpowering you? We’re in a time where it’s easy to add production value to your show, but is it always necessary? Does tech in your show get in the way of you connecting on a human level with your audience?
I could be old school and out of touch, but that’s my opinion. -Louie
Right now I’m on a cruise ship and it’s pretty bumpy out, and I noticed that all of the floors at the stairwells have “sick bags”. These look like paper lunch sacks, but are made of plastic and have a tab at the top to seal them.
I grabbed one and took it back to my state room to see if I could figure out something to do with it. Here’s my brainstorming from this morning:
Chew up some food, spit it in…then blow up the bag and pop it and it’s confetti
Someone reaches into the bag and pulls out a single cookie (it’s the only thing in the bag). You take a few bites and spit them back into the bag. Shake the bag and dump out a whole cookie
You have the bag sealed. You tell the audience you breathed into the bag after breakfast and have someone try to guess what you ate. You have a note that confirms they are right!
Someone from the audience breathes into the bag, and you tell them what they had for breakfast
you have a line of people onstage. With your back turned, someone breathes into the bag and seals it. It’s handed to you and smell the bag and tell whose breath it is
You put food into the bag and it turns to rubber vomit
You say you opened the bag on the plane and captured the air at your seat. Someone smells the air and guesses your row and seat number.
What I like about this is the specific property of the bag, it being plastic and sealable ended up taking me away from tradition paper bag tricks. I really like the idea of trapping air in the bag. I think that the row and seat number might be the winner as it doesn’t involve anyone’s breath, so it’s not cringy.
I don’t know if I’ll ever do this stuff, but it’s a fun creativity exercise. -Louie
When watching Phil Cass’s show the other night, and I’m such a magic nerd, I saw the early and late show on the same night, I was amazed at how tight the show felt, while still feeling loose and unscripted.
Phil has a ton of verbal and physical jokes and bits to use when the occasion presents itself, but he doesn’t always use. These gags are what fill the dead spots in the show and give it a sense of happening now, versus him just saying the same lines every night over and over again.
This tightness is something that takes years to develop and you need a mental toolbox full of jokes, bits and gags that you can pull from whenever a situation happens. It also makes you stay present is your show, as sometimes you’ll use a joke from later in the show because it fits something that just happened.
If you get a chance to see Phil Cass, I recommend it, there’s a lot to learn from watching his show!
