Peter Samelson - Invasion of the Body Snatchers

[Joe Mckay]

A friend got in touch with me and told me I was being unfair to Peter Samelson & his Invasion of the Body Snatchers wild card effect. He said you cannot judge a trick whose premise is so tied into the persona of the magician performing it. Since the only context by which you can judge the trick is by already being familiar with the persona of the magician performing it.

I thought that was a very intelligent point.

I gave my opinions on this trick in the following thread (which has now been locked).

https://forums.geniimagazine.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=52629

This is why I felt I should start a new thread to write this follow-up post. And set the record straight and offer an apology to Peter Samelson.

My friend told me Peter had been on the cover of GENII magazine (twice), and he advised me to use the GENII online archive to dig out those issues and educate myself further on this point. My friend told me it would be like rushing to judgment when watching Ricky Jay use the patter from Erdanse when he performs his McDonald Aces routine. Unless you fully understand the persona of Ricky Jay it would make no sense to mistake that for patter theft.

My friend felt it was unfair of me to slam Peter's trick in the middle of a rant about a totally unrelated topic. Particularly when I was not in a proper position to make such a judgment call. As you can imagine my friend is a big fan of Peter Samelson's magic (which is why he felt he had to set me straight), and has been for a number of decades. He thinks Peter is one of the most important and original thinkers in magic.

So I would like to offer an apology to Peter for making a snap judgment as regards his card trick. It was a particularly rude thing to do since it took place in a thread that was totally unrelated.

I can add that I really enjoyed digging out the two cover stories that focus on Peter's contributions to magic and I look forward to checking out more of his work. My friend says his Penguin lecture is a really good place to start since his books are impossible to find these days since they are so valued by magicians.

I think it might be a good idea if Richard Kaufman locks this thread as well since I just wanted to post this up in order to set the record straight, and just leave it at that.

[Kent Gunn]

Joe,

You can see a performance here.

https://www.penguinmagic.com/p/4834

It's too bad magic isn't theater. At least you shone a light on a great magician and this great routine. You may still believe magical performances are not related to theater, but, your post generated a lot of drama.

[Edward Pungot]

If you fail to recognize the theatrical display your mind generates upon waking up in the morning, give yourself a good wack on the side of the head to get a peak behind the curtain.

[Peter Samelson]

I've just been pointed to your post here.

Thank you,
Peter

[Richard Kaufman]

Joe, you really need to think about your posts for several days BEFORE you post them.

[Chris Randal2]

Joe this was honest and nice. Peter is a modern day legend with his beautiful snowstorm and a wonderful handling of Gypsy Thread and just a great host of Monday Magic. But Joe you are a gentleman in this post. 14 years ago I talked crap to Chris Capeheart once I the lobby of the SAM Vegas convention and was schooled after byChris and the boys. I have since had a wonderful relationship with Mr Capeheart and even his family. Maybe this is the start of something beautiful with you and Peter which would be great and something I would be jealous of. Peter I want that snowstorm bad you rocked me in the 90s SAM convention with that in New Orleans

[Dave Le Fevre]

But Joe you are a gentleman in this post

Exactly my thoughts