How many ways can we drum up publicity ...

[CraigMitchell]

Another 'near miss'

This is the second time the escape has 'gone wrong' conveniently all while the cameras are rolling.

Either the marketing team need to come up with some new ideas or Spencer may seriously wish to consider performing something else

http://nypost.com/2015/09/15/magician-n ... ter-stunt/

[brianarudolph]

"He was scheduled to do a meet-and-greet after the show, but Angel did it instead."

Thank goodness Criss stayed there to cover for Spencer.
Otherwise they would have had to cancel the meet-and-greet had Criss decided to accompany Spencer to the hospital.

[performer]

The best publicity stunt that I ever came across was by the late Paul Goldin in Ireland. He was a legendary stage hypnotist whose name was a household name in Ireland and I knew him personally. In fact it was he who originally suggested I do stage hypnosis.

He stated that he would jump out of a plane without a parachute and by relaxation and meditation he would be able to land unharmed. He set the date around 6 weeks ahead, I believe.

All hell broke loose in the British press. Questions were asked in parliament about the stunt.This went on for weeks no doubt aided by Paul's stirring it up. The esssence of the controversy was that he must be mentally incompetent and should not be allowed to try out the stunt.He in turn came out with New Age quasi- scientific reasons why the stunt would succeed.

People were quite puzzled as to how he was going to pull the stunt off, others thought he was mad and should be stopped for his own safety, and still others believed that he could really do it by the power of his mind.

Came the day of the stunt and Paul traipses up to the airport with his entourage and loads and loads of press and TV people. When he arrived airport security stopped him and said "Mr Goldin, the aviation authorities are banning this for safety reasons" Paul started screaming and shouting and the security people forcibly carried him off the premises. As they carried him out in front of all the press and TV he shouted "How dare you do this! People are now going to think this was a publicity stunt!"

Which it was.

[Ian Kendall]

Heh. He should have just jumped out of the aircraft when it was parked on the ramp.

Having said that, I know that this has happened in the past to win a bet...

[Richard Kaufman]

I think if it happens a third time we can say with certainty that it's a publicity stunt.

You'd think these guys would learn a lesson from Houdini: escape successfully.

[Tom Moore]

...and yet every day across the planet hundreds of performers successfully escape from things and no one knows their name whereas the few people who keep failing to escape are on the network news and being spoken about and shared on message boards and social media across the planet.

[observer]

"He was scheduled to do a meet-and-greet after the show, but Angel did it instead."

Man's a saint. A freakin' saint, I tells ya!

[brianarudolph]

Man's a saint. A freakin' saint, I tells ya!

You mean a Mindfreakin' saint, don't you, observer?

The quick video in the article also strikes me as a bit off for some reason. I can't put my finger on exactly why, though.

While I'm sure Criss and company take every precaution and rehearse both safety and emergency procedures, the reaction of the folks standing by to help Spencer in the event of an emergency seems almost ... well ... for lack of a better word ... too rehearsed. For example, the guy with his back to the camera and his hands behind his back seems to be waiting around more for a cue than he is actually ready to jump with genuine concern for getting to Spencer quickly. Then again, it could just be due to the after effects I'm experiencing from a little pizza and beer.

If it was purely a publicity stunt, I wonder if the failed attempt was only intended to be publicized regionally (to spur ticket sales when Spencer decides to attempt the same escape again that night or the next night on stage) and they weren't counting on the incident going national so it could be repeated a few more times without anyone being the wiser.

If it wasn't a publicity stunt, I hope Spencer reconsiders continuing to perform it - no such challenge is truly worth risking your life for - no matter if performing runs in the family or if you just have "something to prove to yourself."

No matter what, I do hope Spencer is fine and wish him the best.

[Brad Henderson]

maybe he should just steal someone elses trick, film himself doing it at his wedding and post it all over the internet. That seems to work.

[Jonathan Pendragon]

Just because Houdini went down this road, it doesn't mean the rest of us have to.

The danger reality level does seem a bit blurred on this one

I got clobbered doing really dangerous [censored] on Extreme Escapes because I tried to bring to the work a sense of means, was it possible beyond the normal tropes, hence my fusion of Zen. That realism, I believed, required blood, sweat and tears, and they got it. I invented the waterboarding escape and presented it on the show because it's real, I have done it four times and not once did I think I was going to make it. It's as dangerous as they get because an accidental intake of a large amount of water during the escape can be fatal, the tension among the participants is real. I didn't pick a single lock because when you are being waterboarded, who has time?

[Diego]

I wonder if the EMTs that attended to him, knew or suspected this was intended as a non-life threatening stunt, and if so, were they on the taxpayers payroll or paid by the show?

Too many don't get that Houdini, who, "Defied Death" 3 times each day, (breaking for lunch and dinner)would not knowingly risk his egotistical self for those paying 50 cents/a dollar each to see him.

Because actual waterboarding can have it's hazards like underwater escapes, very fortunate that Jonathan knowingly or not, followed James Steranko's warning he put in GENII, with all caps, 51 years ago:

"DO NOT ATTEMPT TO PICK CUFFS/LOCKS UNDERWATER."

[Jonathan Pendragon]

I handled the injury myself on the set, I have been a stuntman since i was 24. I got medical attention later.

I didn't pick the locks, I said that in the post. When you are waterboarded, your not actually underwater.

When it comes to this stuff, I am as expert as you get.

[performer]

I am quite sure that Houdini would never do a publicity stunt where it would show him failing. His ego and pride would not allow that. I am not sure it is such a great thing anyway to advertise your incompetence for the sake of publicity. I suspect it might actually have a detrimental effect on your career in the long run.

And it is not something you can keep doing anyway. If you did, it would either be obvious that you were involved in a publicity stunt or more likely it would make you look like a complete idiot who should be contemplating another area of employment.

[Jonathan Townsend]

... When you are waterboarded, your not actually underwater.

When it comes to this stuff, I am as expert as you get.

cringe. Look at the late chapter in Cory Doctorow's book Little Brother for a description - he posted the book up for free.

Is this leading up to an escape/swap between the subject and interrogator type performance?

[Jonathan Pendragon]

Cringe at what? That was part of thread about Threat-Escape effects. It was on this subject I was making the "expert" reference to. I had to learn all I could about waterboarding before I designed the escape. My method gave a little extra time, that's it. As I mentioned, every time I have presented the escape I honestly believed I was not going to make it. It creates the fear of drowning in you to point where it will override rational thought process and physical action. It breaks you down from horrific anxiety which I have merely glimpsed at and was not interested in going any further.

When I first presented the effect in 2009, it was about calling torture, torture, and not playing with words.