magician as an actor

[Brad Henderson]

Tom

When the magician looks at the speck on the table to wipe it away as cover for returning the card prior to a double life, that is acting.

Just as is it is when they use any reason to justify crossing or double crossing the gaze

Whether that motivation is real or not (meaning the condition actually exists) is as you point out irrelevant. - Just as one’s internal monologue doesn’t need to be about the subject being dramatized to convey feelings intended to be associated with those being dramatized (the difference between Stanislavsky and strausburg,)

But all of these are acting techniques. Whether they are acting techniques more useful for the magician or originated by magicians isn’t the point. If anything that proves my claim that magicians are fundamentally actors - unless you can point us to magi who actually move their hands faster than the eye or violate the laws of nature. If not, then we are looking at people who are acting as those who can do these things.

Your definition also seems to undermine your claim.” An actor is a person whose profession it is to portray a dramatic character in a scripted performance, usually at the theatre or in media such as film, radio, and television.”

A magician is a person
A magician can do this as a profession (though not all actors are professionals)
A magician does play a dramatic character (and comedic ones)
The magician portrays this character in a scripted performance (though actors also perform in improvised contexts as well)
The magician presents their performances in theaters, film, radio, tv and more.

The magician meets all of the qualifications you demand because they are an actor.

If not - I suppose then you would have to denounce everything tommy wonder wrote about internal monologues and you refute what Channing said about imitators who could never know what he was thinking as he was performing their copy?

Are you saying you know better than Tommy and Channing?

[Jonathan Townsend]

Even the "trick that can't be explained" has a script.

How many items do you perform which don't have scripts?

[Tom Stone]

unless you can point us to magi who actually move their hands faster than the eye or violate the laws of nature.

What are you talking about? This is just word salad.
Words do have lexical and semantic meaning. This tendency of yours to redefine terms willy-nilly to suit whatever muddled point you believe you have... it just doesn't work.

If you worked at a booking agency, and someone wanted to hire a magician, and you sent them someone according to your defintion of magician:

A magician is a person
A magician can do this as a profession (though not all actors are professionals)
A magician does play a dramatic character (and comedic ones)
The magician portrays this character in a scripted performance (though actors also perform in improvised contexts as well)
The magician presents their performances in theaters, film, radio, tv and more.

... you'd be fired rather quickly. Likewise if you sent an illusion act to an acting gig.
None of your arguments have any basis in reality. You could use your exact claims to claim that acting is a subset of pantomime, and it would sound identical, and be equally detached from reality.
Presenting fiction is not monopolized by actors, despite your claims. A written novel is a work of fiction - is that "acting" too? A drawn silent animated movie is a work of fiction - is that acting too? Sound design can have a dramatic narrative - is playing instruments also acting? This whole idea of expanding the definitions of words so they encompass everything will make the words useless. When you've managed to make "milk" mean every single kind of fluid on earth, no one will know what a liter of milk means.

The profession is defined by the work involved, and the work involved are vastly different from field to field in the dramatic arts.

Tommy Wonder was, just like me, against the deification of our peers. Invoking his name as an ultimate paladin of "absolute truth" is a disservice against everything he believed in.
Nelm's "Silent Script" is an aid that was created for magicians, but is in no way essential to the performance of magic. For it to work as intended, you need to belong to those who percieve their thoughts like an internal "voice". I've never got that technique to work, since I'm not a part of that group. Evidently, I have had no need for it. Furthermore, I've never heard the technique being used by any actors, so I doubt it is reasonable to dub it one of their techniques.

[Tarotist]

I am completely against "internal monologues" and "silent scripts". I detest the very idea of them. Magic is PEOPLE not babbling around in your head talking to yourself. You have enough to do dealing with the people in front of you. You have to sum up what kind of people they are, how to manipulate them, how to know what the hell is going on their minds. You can't do that effectively if your attention is centered on chattering to your inner self.
As for Henning Nelms he knew as much about magic as I do about the care and breeding of Japanese butterflies.

[Brad Henderson]

Tom.

My words are accurate. I’ll use smaller ones to help you

Are there people who call themselves magicians who can move their fingers faster than the eye can see?

Are there people who call themselves magicians who can actually violate the laws of nature?

No, you say?

Then these people are pretending to be people who can move their fingers faster than the eye can see and are pretending to violate the laws of nature.

They are therefore - acting.

—-/

Your inability to maintain an internal monologue doesn’t prove that Wonder didn’t. He clearly did. And that is acting.

That he could do this and you can’t speaks to him being a more skilled actor than you. It says nothing about whether or not acting is a critical skill in the production of magic.

Do you deny that what he is speaking of isn’t a tool of actor and the idea of expressing internal emotional and intellectual processes isn’t exactly acting?

—-

And if you don’t like your definition then get a better one. I can’t help it that your definition of what an actor does is exactly the same as what a magician does

Though I know of several shows where bookers have asked for just what you requested and hired those with zero magic skills who managed to front shows playing the role of a magician. It’s very common in theme parks throughout the US for performers of magic shows to be trained actors who manipulate props during their performances. I saw one at Disney just the other day.

Are you telling me that the person playing dr strange doing a magic show isn’t an actor? How is what this actor is doing different than what any other magician has done? (Other than be successful?)

[Brad Henderson]

And I love invoking wonder to condemn the act of invoking wonder. That’s some next level hypocrisy

[katterfelt0]

Here's what I get from all of this discussion: Brad and Tom should never attend the same cocktail party.

[Paco Nagata]

Here's what I get from all of this discussion: Brad and Tom should never attend the same cocktail party.

You're wrong Jim!

That's what precisely makes a cocktail party interesting, thrilling and amusing! ^_^

Seriously, anyone can take some important thoughts and conclusions from this kind of healthy conversational fighting.

[Tom Stone]

I can’t help it that your definition of what an actor does is exactly the same as what a magician does

You can't help it being your definition. It is most certainly not my definition, because in my definition of a magician, deception and its related skills have a central defining role. You are somewhat alone in believing that conjuring know-how in a magician is redundant.

You're still pretending that acting have monopoly on all fiction, yet you have given no reasons or motivations for that belief. You have also not given any reasons why you've picked acting to be your 'catch-all'. Why not pantomime?

Not that I ever considered "fast fingers" or "violating laws of nature" to essential to conjuring, but here goes:
Can I draw an animation of stick figures who move their fingers faster than the eye can see?
Can I draw an animation of stick figures who violate the laws of nature?
Yes and yes.
Are any of those drawn characters real? Nope.
So in your world, those stick figures must be actors, well suited to compete with other actors for roles. Right?

I don't care that Tommy got Nelm's "Silent Script" to work for him. If it works, it works. But it is not an essential technique, and it is also not an acting technique. Tommy was an ok actor, far better than me anyway, because he studied acting for a while. There's a short film somewhere on Youtube where you can see him in an acting role. So why did he use Nelm's technique instead of proper acting techniques in his work? Maybe because the latter are not directly transferable.

Are you telling me that the person playing dr strange doing a magic show isn’t an actor?

Why would I tell you that? None of the dramatic arts exist in a vacuum. Skills can be combined - but the person playing Dr. Strange doesn't become a magician just because someone have taught him a few tricks, just as he wouldn't become a dancer just because someone have taught him a simple choreography specific to the part, or a chef just because someone have taught him to fry an egg.

I didn't quite know what performance you meant, but Google led me to it.
So, this is someone who undoubtably are using acting techniques to a far larger degree than any magician I know. So if magic actually is a function of acting, this performance should be among the best, strongest and most deceptive magic acts we've ever seen. So let's take a look at it - this thing that Brad think is great magic.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MH6HSVyraNY

[Jack Shalom]

Tom, the concept of subtext is a basic basic acting technique taught to first year acting students. You personally might not like using it for magic, but to deny it's an acting technique is absurd.

Magicians might like to look at the chapters in Stanislavski's An Actor Prepares on Bits and Objectives, Super Objectives, and especially Communion, which prefigures Tamariz's Five Points in Magic by more than half a century.

[Tom Stone]

Tom, the concept of subtext is a basic basic acting technique taught to first year acting students. You personally might not like using it for magic, but to deny it's an acting technique is absurd.

Jack, I am well aware of subtexts, and various acting techniques implementing it. But acting doesn't have monopoly on subtext. I am also aware of similar techniques used in writing, and even in painting. But I am not aware of any acting school that is teaching Nelm's Silent Script technique, which if you don't remember it is to write out on a paper enough lines to fill all the gaps in your speech, then recite these lines mentally while you perform. The only thing in acting that comes even close to that, that I'm aware of, is Keith Johnstone's "Fastfood Stanislavsky"-lists... and those are mostly just single words, and they are applied straight through, not only in the gaps in the speech.

[Tom Stone]

Magicians might like to look at the chapters in Stanislavski's An Actor Prepares ...

I think "The Technique of Acting" by Stella Adler might be more applicable to a magician with an interest in combining acting and magic. Mixing it up with Viola Spolin and Keith Johnstone is not a bad idea.

[Tarotist]

Tom, the concept of subtext is a basic basic acting technique taught to first year acting students. You personally might not like using it for magic, but to deny it's an acting technique is absurd.

Jack, I am well aware of subtexts, and various acting techniques implementing it. But acting doesn't have monopoly on subtext. I am also aware of similar techniques used in writing, and even in painting. But I am not aware of any acting school that is teaching Nelm's Silent Script technique, which if you don't remember it is to write out on a paper enough lines to fill all the gaps in your speech, then recite these lines mentally while you perform. The only thing in acting that comes even close to that, that I'm aware of, is Keith Johnstone's "Fastfood Stanislavsky"-lists... and those are mostly just single words, and they are applied straight through, not only in the gaps in the speech.

I am shuddering at the very mention of this "Silent Script" twaddle. Writing out some drivel to fill in gaps and reciting them in your mind like a mental patient is a great route to mediocrity and I squirm at the very thought of it. I happen to know that Tommy Wonder for all his arty farty theorising used to sell Squirmles in the street. I bet he learned ten times more from that than he ever did silent scripting. The only scripting that goes through your head in that environment is "I wish these bastards would get their money out!!" I should know if anyone does.................

[Bob Coyne]

Since Houdin is trying to re-cast the notion of magician, I think it's a mistake to take "actor" too rigidly either. An actor can be "a person who performs on the stage, on television or in films, especially as a profession," as we typically think of it. But it can also be "a person who plays a part, pretending by their behavior to be a particular kind of person" or as Houdin says "playing the part of a magician." It's this latter sense of acting/actor that captures what's essential in Houdin's formulation.

In addition, the magician's acting duties clearly go beyond merely conveying the role of a magician (as Houdin defines it). As Brad points out, "when the magician looks at the speck on the table to wipe it away as cover for returning the card prior to a double life, that is acting." i.e. Acting also enhances misdirection or otherwise aids in the deception, even when it's not strictly related to playing the part of a magician. So however you slice it, the magician (as performer) is acting and needs skills of that sort, whether or not you want to call that being an "actor."

[Philippe Billot]

Here is a simple explanation

A conjuror is not a juggler; he is an actor playing the part of a magician:

If you want to do a "magic show", don't be a "juggler" because you simply show your skill.
But if you want to be a magician, there is a problem.
Magician doesn't exist, so you have to fake it, to pretend to be a magician.
So play the role of a magician (like an actor does when he interprets the role of a magician).

But you don't need to have studied at Actor Studio as everry child is able to pretend to be a magician

[Tom Stone]

In addition, the magician's acting duties clearly go beyond merely conveying the role of a magician (as Houdin defines it). As Brad points out, "when the magician looks at the speck on the table to wipe it away as cover for returning the card prior to a double life, that is acting." i.e. Acting also enhances misdirection or otherwise aids in the deception, even when it's not strictly related to playing the part of a magician. So however you slice it, the magician (as performer) is acting and needs skills of that sort, whether or not you want to call that being an "actor."

Acting can definitely be adapted and utilized. The problem is that it is a whole other profession to be an actor, a whole other art with their own vast body of skills and techniques - with aspects that only make sense within acting. If we need to reduce all that, a whole artistic field, into a fraction of what it actually is, solely to make sense of a largely misunderstood quote from some ancient french dude... then we make both ourself and the world of acting a disservice.

Occasionally, when making props, I utilize some of the skills of a graphic designer. So is a magician a graphic designer pretending to be a magician? No, of course not. Not even if the propmaking makes me interested in that field and starts studying graphic design until I can get hired as a graphic designer.

Last week I built a small table designed to deliver a big load. Having it was essential to the piece, without it there would be nothing to perform. No amount of acting techniques would be able to replace the table, I could apply the Stanislavskian system, Brecht, Grotowski, Spolin, Adler, and Brook... but no amount of acting techniques would deliver the final load into my hand and let me end the piece the way it was written. The whole piece relied on making use of skills of a carpenter. So is a magician a carpenter pretending to be a magician? No, of course not. A carpenter would never be able to do what I did, since the build was based on years of conjuring knowledge, knowing what people look at, and what they don't look at. Conversely, I can't do what a carpenter does. It is two different fields, even when a few skills occasionally are transferable.

Fiction and a lot of the dramatic arts have their origin in just pretending. They have evolved from that mutual point into different arts and crafts, and have developed structures and techniques unique to themselves. A kid pretending that the floor is lava isn't an actor but a kid wading through the primordial plasma of drama. A clown is pretending in a structured way that is unique to clowning. An actor is pretending in a structured way that is unique to acting. A fiction writer is pretending in a structured way that is unique to fiction writing. They are not the same. Different skillsets, different techniques, different knowledge base. Yes, it is possible to combine it. The clown Bill Irwin played the role of the mutant scientist Cary Loudermilk in the TV-series "Legion", but he only used his clowning skillset during the short bits where his "mutant powers" manifested, the rest of the time he used his acting skillset.

We do have loads of dramatic techniques already present in magic. A lot of it is still not formalized or defined, but it is there. With Crossing the Gaze alone, you can get intent and direction in ways that can't be duplicated with any of the acting techniques, no matter how many years you spend on studying Stanislavsky, Adler, Meisner, et cetera. Applying their techniques more likely drown the deceptions than aid them.

[Tom Stone]

Here is a simple explanation

A conjuror is not a juggler; he is an actor playing the part of a magician:

If you want to do a "magic show", don't be a "juggler" because you simply show your skill.
But if you want to be a magician, there is a problem.
Magician doesn't exist, so you have to fake it, to pretend to be a magician.
So play the role of a magician (like an actor does when he interprets the role of a magician).

There are many flaws in that.
First of all, magicians exists, if we talk about those concerned with conjuring art and craft. We are not related to fictional magicians like Gandalf, Merlin, Flagg... just as current day mathematicians aren't related to fictional mathematicians like Hari Seldon. Just because the fictional field of Psychohistory isn't real, does not make current day math any less math.

Also, remember Tony 'Doc' Shiels "All magic is mental". While an actor need to act in order for the audience to experience what the actor aim for, a magician does not. You can perform a well-written piece straight, and the spectator will form the conclusion "magic" on their own. Pretending to be a fictional magician like Merlin might aid the entertainment value, but seen from the deceptive components, it is redundant

[katterfelt0]

Magicians might like to look at the chapters in Stanislavski's An Actor Prepares ...

I think "The Technique of Acting" by Stella Adler might be more applicable to a magician with an interest in combining acting and magic. Mixing it up with Viola Spolin and Keith Johnstone is not a bad idea.

As a comedy improviser it's nice to see the last two names on your list.

[Jack Shalom]

No acting required--it just happens--like magic!:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipuhaWhJ_EY

[Jack Shalom]

A kid pretending that the floor is lava isn't an actor but a kid wading through the primordial plasma of drama. A clown is pretending in a structured way that is unique to clowning. An actor is pretending in a structured way that is unique to acting.

Ah, so glad you wrote this, because for me it clarifies our differences. It's why I thought a definition of acting was essential for communicating on this subject. For me--and I think a lot of others--an actor is one who pretends through the use of one's body and/or voice, to be what one is not; or one who appears to be doing what one is not really doing, for entertainment purposes.

The house of acting is large; it contains many rooms. That is why I strongly disagree with the sentences of yours I quoted. The kid is indeed an actor for those moments.

[Tom Stone]

No acting required--it just happens--like magic!:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipuhaWhJ_EY

Thanks! I love Pop Haydn's work! This is a good combination of acting and magic, even though the acting have little effect on the magic.
If you look at Jonathan Neal's bottle routine, you'll see less acting and more emphasis the kind of drama that are unique to our own field, and how it results in an even more exiting piece. Not because the lack of acting, but because everything in the piece is pulling in the same direction.

[Tom Stone]

The house of acting is large; it contains many rooms. That is why I strongly disagree with the sentences of yours I quoted. The kid is indeed an actor for those moments.

An animator's work is also an expression of the same thing, as is a writer of fiction. So, if you write fiction novels, you are an actor? If you draw animations, you are an actor? Someone who is lying to their spouse about where they've been is basically telling a fiction, so that person can also put "Actor" on their business card? When everyone in the world are actors, then no one is actor. The word have lost its meaning.

There is no way the kid in the example above can have a meaningful discussion with acting peers about the art and craft of being an actor.

[Bob Coyne]

Terms like "actor" or "teacher" or "athlete" etc generally have two senses. The primary sense is stricter and generally means a person who does that professionally or as their main endeavor. But if you relax these definitions and look at what's essential, then you can employ them more broadly. A reasonable looser definition for "actor" is the one I gave earlier ("a person who plays a part, pretending by their behavior to be a particular kind of person"). This is what Houdin is getting at when he says a magician is an actor playing the part of a magician.

Now, whether you play that role of magician convincingly (conveying the right emotions in sync with the action) or entertainingly (employing effective dramatic timing or using humor) or deceptively (acting as if your hand is empty when it isn't) is where acting skills come into play. But even if you do them poorly, it's still acting as long as you modify your behavior and emotions to suit the role you're playing. At its core (the looser definition), acting is not about the skills involved or how well they're executed or whether it's done professionally or in traditional genres, but the broader endeavor of playing a part.

Nonetheless, it's still an interesting conversation as to how acting skills vary between magic and more traditional forms of acting. Similarly, you can examine the differences between stage acting vs film acting vs the type of acting done in improv comedy. For example, stage acting requires memorizing and reciting multitudes of lines, while improv requires thinking them up and delivering at the spur of the momement. Film acting involves having a certain delivery that plays well to close-ups, while stage acting involves projecting your voice and gestures to a live audience. And then there are also "voice actors" who inhabit their roles using only their voices. It's another more constrained type of acting, but it's still acting.

[Richard Kaufman]

The house of acting is large; it contains many rooms. That is why I strongly disagree with the sentences of yours I quoted. The kid is indeed an actor for those moments.

I'm sorry Jack, but a person who is pretending is most definitely NOT an actor. Full stop. And that's why magicians are not actors--they're pretending, not acting.

[Tom Stone]

Terms like "actor" or "teacher" or "athlete" etc generally have two senses. The primary sense is stricter and generally means a person who does that professionally or as their main endeavor. But if you relax these definitions...

That is very true. You could be named "teacher" just by showing a kid how to fold a paper airplane. But it would be rather weird if members of the National Education Association, on their own forums, would claim that folding paper airplanes was the defining skill of a teacher.
Do we not take it for granted that when performers talk about the various performing arts, we use the primary sense of the terms?

I've seen football players being described as "magicians on the field", but I don't recall anyone here talking about them as if they were conjurers, so it seems the primary sense of the terms are what we use.

[AJM]

Private Eye’s Pseud’s Corner column should have enough material from here for the foreseeable future.

https://www.lexico.com/definition/pseud's_corner

[Paco Nagata]

I'm sorry Jack, but a person who is pretending is most definitely NOT an actor. Full stop. And that's why magicians are not actors--they're pretending, not acting.

Well, that would be the case if there weren't an audience (like the "lava's kid"). But magicians have always an audience, and pretending in front of an audience implies being an actor (from the point of view of magicians, not the audience, of course).

[Bob Farmer]

Amateur magicians are actors playing the part of professional magicians who are actors playing the part of magicians.
--Robert Houdin Farmer

[Paco Nagata]

Amateur magicians are actors playing the part of professional magicians who are actors playing the part of magicians.
--Robert Houdin Farmer

That reminds me certain popular sentence by Groucho Marx from "A Night at the Opera"...

By the way, Groucho said once he was not a real actor, since he acted in his movies like in his real life. Maybe that's the concept Mr. Stone is talking about.

[Richard Kaufman]

Actors are not pretending. Acting is not pretending in the sense you mean it.

[Jack Shalom]

An animator's work is also an expression of the same thing, as is a writer of fiction. So, if you write fiction novels, you are an actor? If you draw animations, you are an actor? Someone who is lying to their spouse about where they've been is basically telling a fiction, so that person can also put "Actor" on their business card? When everyone in the world are actors, then no one is actor. The word have lost its meaning.

Read my definition Tom. The use of the body and voice to pretend for entertainment. That is the key. Neither the writer, nor animator, nor painter engage their body and voice in front of an audience. And a lying spouse is not doing it for entertainment, just as a gambling cheat is not a magician, though they both may palm cards.

And Richard, actors most definitely do pretend. They use the truth of their emotions to pretend they are what they are not. I assure you Mr. Hopkins was only pretending to be a mass murderer who ate the body parts of children.

[Tarotist]

Magicians are trying to pretend they are actors but can't quite manage it yet.

[Jack Shalom]

Almost, Mark. Too many of them ignore that they are part of an art with a long tradition that tells you how to comport yourself up there--and so end up talking into their sleeves--but their passes are really good.

[Tarotist]

In that case I shall try another description. Most "magicians" are pretending they are magicians but can't quite manage it yet. I have seen very. very few good magicians in my entire life. The standard is remarkably low. Most of them couldn't make the contents of an empty box disappear.

[Richard Kaufman]

An animator's work is also an expression of the same thing, as is a writer of fiction. So, if you write fiction novels, you are an actor? If you draw animations, you are an actor? Someone who is lying to their spouse about where they've been is basically telling a fiction, so that person can also put "Actor" on their business card? When everyone in the world are actors, then no one is actor. The word have lost its meaning.

Read my definition Tom. The use of the body and voice to pretend for entertainment. That is the key. Neither the writer, nor animator, nor painter engage their body and voice in front of an audience. And a lying spouse is not doing it for entertainment, just as a gambling cheat is not a magician, though they both may palm cards.

And Richard, actors most definitely do pretend. They use the truth of their emotions to pretend they are what they are not. I assure you Mr. Hopkins was only pretending to be a mass murderer who ate the body parts of children.

He was not "pretending" to be a mass murderer. He was acting the part of a mass murderer.

[Tom Stone]

Read my definition Tom. The use of the body and voice to pretend for entertainment.

Just a few moments ago, you said a kid pretending that the floor is lava is an actor. So... that kid is doing that for the entertainment of others? That the kid play for the sake of playing is impossible?

Neither the writer, nor animator, nor painter engage their body and voice in front of an audience. And a lying spouse is not doing it for entertainment, just as a gambling cheat is not a magician, though they both may palm cards.

Intriguing. So you've decided that "actor" arbitrarily include kids playing, but arbitrarily exclude those who are pretending via paper. And none of it is related to the actual art and craft of acting? Perhaps we should also remove actors from the definition of acting, since actual acting skills are so redundant in the stuff you call acting.

It is completely reasonable then, when meeting an actor, to say "I'm also an actor! Acting is my passion and profession. I definitely have never concerned myself with conjuring, bleh!" and when asked where you've studied acting, reply "I learnt the Elmsley Count off YouTube"...

I assure you Mr. Hopkins was only pretending to be a mass murderer who ate the body parts of children.

So there's no difference between pretending and acting. Hopkins could have been replaced with anyone from the street, no need for acting techniques, any random person pretending would be enough.

[JHostler]

All of this is so painfully academic - not to bash academics, but the misplaced assumption is that all of this back-and forth is somehow adding value. Didn't the Professor once say "The magician does his thing. And 'the thing' only matters to the extent that it astonishes, entertains, and reflects the performer's artistic vision?" [OK, he didn't... but he might as well have.]

Are DaOrtiz, Carney, or Jillette "actors?" (Carney actually is, but that's a peripheral gig.) Does it matter?

Tarotist is spot-on. This is an exercise in semantics.

It is only academic semantics if you don't actually work with it. If you work with these tools, it is a pragmatic and tangible reality.

I don't think anyone is arguing that theatrical techniques or acting skills can't be brought to bear in magic. It is obvious that they can. The point of contention pervading this discussion seems to be whether a magician "is" an actor. And that question, in and of itself, is 100% theoretical.

Yeah, going meta. This is all about the definitions of "is" and "actor" and (now) "pretending." How does this conversation contribute to the betterment of our field if (presumably) we already understand that "acting techniques" - or whatever one wishes to call them - can be applied to the performance of magic? Why does it matter a whit if one person labels the application of such techniques "acting" and another labels them "pretending?" The label alone changes nothing.

[Tarotist]

I suppose it could be said that Cardini was a superb actor. However, he wasn't an "actor". I think what is missing in this conversation
is that there are two definitions of the word "Actor". There is the sort of actor who has been to drama school and has made a deep study of the subject and the sort of actor that the rest of humanity is. In other words every single person on the planet does some acting at some time or other in their daily lives, whether it is to tell a lie or for some other nefarious or non nefarious purpose. They may be good actors or bad actors but they are indeed acting.

I believe most magicians come under this latter category. Getting back to Cardini it states in Henry Hay's "Learn Magic" that "Cardini is an actor playing with unbelievable perfection the part of a tipsy man about town, whose hands won't behave----not with a pack of cards anyway" Now I am no expert on Cardini but I bet he didn't go to acting school. He was in the second category I am referring to.

Fred Kaps was also a great actor when performing but he wasn't an ACTOR! I bet he never went to acting school or took acting lessons. I suppose I could be wrong but I doubt it. I AM psychic after all!

Wilfrid Jonson wrote in reference to some trick or other, "To make the trick a pleasant little comedy you will need to act it out a bit and I will tell you here the true secret of conjuring. The REAL secret of conjuring is ACTING. In your first efforts try to imagine that you are really doing what you pretend to do. Let your imagination direct your actions so so that later you can act as if you were really doing what you say you can do"

This is great wisdom and an excellent explanation of how acting relates to magic. However, I bet old Wilfrid never went to acting school. A magician is not an actor per se. However acting is part and parcel of his craft. It is not a separate thing. The best magicians put on a bit of an act either in presentation or for technical reasons. However they are not ACTORS-----they are merely acting which is not quite the same thing.

[Jack Shalom]

Intriguing. So you've decided that "actor" arbitrarily include kids playing, but arbitrarily exclude those who are pretending via paper.

Are you trying deliberately to not understand? The body, the voice, Tom. That's not arbitrary. Do you really think writers are the same as actors?

So there's no difference between pretending and acting. Hopkins could have been replaced with anyone from the street, no need for acting techniques, any random person pretending would be enough.

? Why would you come to that conclusion? When we pay millions of dollars, we want the best, most convincing pretenders. That's why we want trained actors. Unfortunately there are magicians who think they are above such training. It seems like you are deliberately trying to misunderstand.

[Jack Shalom]

How does this conversation contribute to the betterment of our field if (presumably) we already understand that "acting techniques" - or whatever one wishes to call them - can be applied to the performance of magic? Why does it matter a whit if one person labels the application of such techniques "acting" and another labels them "pretending?" The label alone changes nothing.

Agreed; and the point I have made repeatedly is that the reason it is important is because there is already a vast literature and body of knowledge relating to acting that is exactly what many magicians are not familiar with and never think of looking at, to their detriment in my opinion, because they don't think it applies to them.