Newspaper hats, anyone?

[Damian Odess-Gillett]

Hi All,

I just saw a clip of Bob Read performing his newspaper hats routine. Loved it. Brand new for me, I've never seen anything like that before. Does anyone know if the routine is published, or where one might learn about a transforming newspaper hat?

Thanks,
Damian

[Q. Kumber]

Gene Anderson has a newspaper routine published in Newspaper Magic. Jay Marshall had another routine. Inspired by both, Bob Read developed his routine which he published in his 1996 Lecture Notes "What You Get Is What I Do."

It may be available on his DVD set published by International Magic of London.

[Damian Odess-Gillett]

Quentin, thank you!
I actually saw the clip on the International Magic set, which I just recently bought--I see that those lecture notes are included in PDF, on the last disc.

[Master Payne]

Be warned that most of these hat routines no longer work with your average newspaper these days as they are a different size than they used to be.

We have a club member who has done Mr Anderson's routine for years and years and he laments that he now has to glue a three inch strip of newsprint om the bottom of the page to get the hats to work properly

Something they failed to mention in the new "updated" edition of Newspaper Magic. I'm suprised that this, and the fact that there are a few rather dated and now quite politically uncorrect routines left in tha publication as well was not mentioned in the most recent review of this text in a recent Genii

[Spellbinder]

Eleazar Goodenough, author of "Tear-Able Magic" (available on my site), does quite a bit of hat magic, including Hat Rings. But for the former newspaper hats, he uses giftwrap paper instead. If your routine is about taking a sheet of paper and turning it into a variety of hats (using origami techniques rather than gimmicked hats of the type he describes in "Tear-Able Magic") the giftwrap is a good colorful alternative. If you get your giftwrap paper from the Dollar Store, it can be a bit on the flimsy side, but it is cheap and easy to give away without flinching. It can also be themed for Birthdays, Seasons, and special occasions, or just plain colorful patterns that are non-specific.

Lu Brent's newspaper hat fold (often called the "Ali Bongo Growing Hat") is best made from no-tear Tyvec paper, as described in The Wizards' Journal #8.

[Q. Kumber]

Supreme Magic used sell Lu Brent's effect as The Big Head Hat. Neville Wiltshire from Dublin had the idea of attaching a thread to it, so everytime you put it on a child's head and walked away, it would fall off.

Ali Bongo added the colour and the face and it evolved into the Bongo Hat.

Practical Magic have just released a Christmas version with Santa's head on the final side. You can see it at:
http://www.practical-magic.com/index.ph ... &Itemid=26

[james graham]

as a folder of origami, and having seen a most excellent torn and restored news paper trick, i was informed by the magician that newspapers over seas are often just single page inserts instead of our folded variety. this can affect you if you plan presentations out of the 50 states.

[Dale Shrimpton]

At a push, you can use wallpaper. Or to be more precice, Lining paper. This is very close to news print, but not printed.

Its realy cheap too!

[Spellbinder]

as a folder of origami, and having seen a most excellent torn and restored news paper trick, i was informed by the magician that newspapers over seas are often just single page inserts instead of our folded variety. this can affect you if you plan presentations out of the 50 states.

I just wondered if the magazines and comic books are different outside of the US as well. Jim Gerrish's Torn and Restored Comic Book works best with the double pages stapled in the center of the book. He has adaptations for comics and magazines that are single sheets glued along the binding, but is there any other variety for binding comics or magazines we are not aware of?