The hilarious Laurence Leung was commissioned by Australian radio station triplej to create a few magic videos to promote their Hottest 100 vote and countdown. Leung recruited Simon Coronel to devise and perform four close-up clips which are explicitly performed without camera cuts or CGI.
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Huge congratualtions from everyone here at iTricks to Derren Brown for taking home the “Best Entertainment Programme” BAFTA this weekend. DvB nabbed the award for his series The Experiments on Channel 4. The British Academy of Film and Television Awards are equivalent to the Emmy’s here in the states.
This is Brown’s first BAFTA award.
As magic camp season gets into full swing, here is a tale of inspiration for you.
In 1983 a young magician met his idol at Tannen’s Jubiliee magic convention. Steve no doubt had to muster up the courage to flag down and ask for a picture with David Copperfield himself. He did, you can see the proof above.
Flash forward 29 years later.
Steve is now Steve Cohen: The Millionaire’s Magician. His show Chamber Magic at the Waldorf-Astoria is a fixture in New York City. Last week, he looked up into his audience and who did he see starring back at him? The same eyes he’d watched countless times on television and on stage, Copperfield.
So if you are planning on spending the summer working on your act or happen to have a Facebook picture of yourself next to your magic idol, no matter how famous they are, just think that one day you could have a great show and that magic idol could be in your audience.
And in case you were wondering, DC loved the show.
While hanging out in the Late Night with Jimmy Fallon green room getting ready to go on, Penn & Teller answered a few questions in the form of haikus. They even answered them in 5-7-5 haiku format.
Learn which show in Vegas is P&T’s favorite as well as what books beginning magicians should pick up.
How poetic.
Oh boy, we got our first whiff of magic fail on AGT last night. The unfortunate distinction belonged to Michael Griffin, an escape artist who performed at the Tampa auditions. Although clearly an engaging character, Griffin made the fatal error of allowing judge Howard Stern to completely tie his ropes.
It made for a great banter oppertunity between the self-styled King of All Media and fellow judge Sharon Osbourne but poor knot making. Griffin was buzzed and eliminated.
In sunnier news, illusionists Jonathan Hawley and his lovely assistant made it to Vegas on the strength of a metamorphosis illusion.
Videos for the AGT recaps are gathered by Brandon Parnes.
UPDATE: As we’ve been rightly informed in the comments, this routine is a fairly direct rip off of Derren Brown’s Evening of Wonders routine. Between this and the Piff rip, apparently you can’t spell Ukrainian Magic without UK. Sorry folks!
David Crosser is an iTricks reader who is currently in competition on Ukraine’s Got Talent. Although this semi-final performance isn’t in English, there is no translation needed at 13:26 when at the finale of his performance the judges totally bite on his final misdirection and buzz him off stage.
The reveal, which launches one judge out of his seat in amazement, is great.
The Lottery Ticket by Nate Staniforth
As performed by David Blaine in his 2008 “Dive of Death” special on ABC:
In a theater, a banquet hall, a restaurant, a coffee shop, a street corner; the performer places a wallet in full view.
Six spectators are randomly selected, and each is asked to choose a number between one and fifty.
The performer opens the wallet and removes a lottery ticket. The numbers printed on the lottery ticket match the numbers selected by the spectators.
This is a miracle.
In The Lottery Ticket, Nate Staniforth explains every facet of the lottery illusion and provides the reader with all of the information necessary to perform it on the stage, from the platform, in a coffee shop, on the street, and in a number of other performance environments. The book covers the design, handling, theory, and philosophy that have gone into Nate’s creation and takes the reader step by step through the necessary preparations required to perform the effect.
The Lottery Ticket is limited to 150 copies for professional magicians and mentalists. It will never be reprinted.
