Transcript
How do you do that?
I can't tell you, because that's the secret code of the magician.
But even when I'm so close to it, and you just can't see where it goes!
No, this technique is called close-up magic or table magic. It's a very nice way of doing magic because your audience is not only in the front, but at the rear, at the back, so a good magician has his eyes everywhere.
In preparing this interview, you did put a lot of things over here. I honestly don't know what's going to happen, but I'm very curious.
I have here a couple of books. Five themes: Dracula, Frankenstein, Dracula Christmas Carol, Jane Austen, Persuasion and Sherlock Holmes. Take a book.
Just any book? Okay, let's take Dracula.
Ah, your favorite one, or...?
I like the book.
Oh, you like the book. Open the book and look at a word, it doesn't matter.
So any page?
Any page.
And I take a word.
Yeah. Close the book, you can leave it there. So, take another book, for example Sherlock Holmes or Christmas Carol.
For example, look at the same page number, maybe there are viewers who say: "All the books are the same, only the front is different". So you have the same page; are there the same words in there?
No, it's a different book.
So the word you have thought of is not in the book?
For example, in another book? Because...
This book doesn't even have the page. So it's real, it's real.
I have a word here, which I think is the one you're thinking of. It could be any word; it's more than a million words. What was your word?
Weakly.
Weakly, it is.
How the hell do you do that?
That's impressive, I'm speechless.
I'll leave the books there; after the interview is done please look at all the pages. They are real. So, this is mentalism; this is not the sleight of hand. This is more the psychological stuff.
You're already answering my next question. I was wondering: isn't magic old-fashioned? But if I see this...
No, the magic is old, but not old-fashioned.
But still impressive. Show me another thing.
Okay, something with cards. More like we call it: 'sleight of hand', but I shall do it very slowly so everyone can see it in slow-motion so that there is no tricky movement with sleight of hand. A deck of cards; I do it like this. I hope everyone can see it now here. All the cards are in there, except the joker. So there is no joker inside. I have here a dome with one card in a class. You can pick any card and point with your finger to one card.
It doesn't matter which one. That one. I can take it?
Yeah, you can take it. I show to the camera that all the cards are different, of course, otherwise it wouldn't be a trick, it would be cheating, and I don't cheat. Okay, what was your card? And this card I show has a red back, and yours has a blue back so you can keep it as a souvenir. And this is what they call 'sleight of hand'.
But is that also why there are such price-differences? When you ask for the price of a magician, you sometimes get very cheap prices, sometimes very high. Is this the reason? Because of the complexity of tricks?
This is one of the reasons. The most important reason is that a professional has to live from his profession and an amateur doesn't. Mostly an amateur does it as a side job. Everyone can do a trick; the ; one-trick-pony' we say. But for magical entertainment, that's more than a one trick pony. And that's the main reason why there's such a huge difference in style.
Maybe to conclude with: I see a dice over there.
This is very simple. What I have here, it's a die. Do you know the secret of the die? The secret of the die is always seven. Under the five is always the two. Under the three the four, and under the one the six. If you have a die that does not have this rule; then don't play with it. What you can do... I turn around. What you can do: think about a number of the die. For example six. With one hand you make a table. Then you put your number on top and you close it with your other hand but also the side, because of the side I can guess of the rule of seven.
Okay, I don't look. I can show it to the camera?
You can show it to the camera, and we haven't made any arrangement.
No.
Okay, so this is your choice now?
This is funny, because if it is your choice, you could pick any number of the die except five. If you have picked five, you have done my choice. What do you have?
I have five.
Show it. Yeah.
Do it again. This was more psychological. The second time it's harder for me. You can change any time you like and then you make your final decision. And when you're happy, you say: "I'm happy". Are you happy? Okay! So the first one was five. Psychologically, most people on the second time pick an even number after picking an odd number. But you didn't do that. You had the five odd. So that's the highest one, and you are now to the lowest one. And that's the one, odd. So yeah, this is all mental stuff, psychological stuff, and I like this.
I really like this stuff, Richard, thank you for coming over.
Thank you.
And you at home; thank you for watching our show. I hope to see you next time.
