Blaine To Quit?

Discuss the latest news and rumors in the magic world.
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Blaine To Quit?

Postby Guest » September 22nd, 2003, 12:31 pm

We came across an article discussing the possibility that Blaine may be considering an early end to the "Above the Below" stunt because of the reaction of the British public.

Obviously, the link has been posted with a story summary at The Linking Page.
http://www.linkingpage.com

Matt R
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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Matt R » September 23rd, 2003, 6:47 am

On the humorous side, check out this game where
you can kill David Blaine in a box. Make sure
you win the game to see the movie at the end:

http://www.brianmung.com/blainegame.htm

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Richard Kaufman » September 23rd, 2003, 8:09 am

Here's a new article (the link is from magictimes.com) regarding the behind the scenes furor within Blaine's camp and the TV companies over his current stunt:
http://generic.yellowbrix.com/pages/gen ... rlist=&ID=
Not a pretty story.
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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Carl Mercurio » September 23rd, 2003, 2:23 pm

I really feel bad for the guy. His handlers must be kicking themselves over the fact that they had considered Tokyo as a venue but went to London instead. He could have played up the notion of an eastern spiritual cleansing, a Zen Buddhism kind-of thing. And you can bet the crowds in Tokyo would never act like they're acting in London. The ironic thing is that the stunt is called "Above the Below," suggesting he's removed from it all. So none of this is supposed to be bothering him. Maybe it isn't. We haven't heard from David yet. I don't know why they washed the eggs and whatever else had been thrown off the box. If his handlers were smart, they would have played this up not as a blemish on Blaine's "image" but a reflection of culture or of certain ugly aspects of human nature. Just because a seagull [censored] on a statue of George Washington in the park doesn't diminish GW. But maybe people are reacting to what they think is a fraud or a public display of pretentiousness or a living cartoon. As Pete Biro would say, Stay Tooned....

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Pete Biro » September 23rd, 2003, 2:48 pm

Not only do I say Stay Tooned... but, you just wait... I believe Blaine knows exactly what he's doing... getting more ink than anyone in the history of magic and making more money than most.
Stay tooned.

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Todd Robbins » September 23rd, 2003, 4:07 pm

There are a number of inaccuracies in that article that I spotted, so how much more of it is just plain wrong? Pete's right. He's getting press. That's what this is all about.

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Sal Perrotta » September 23rd, 2003, 7:40 pm

Do all of you really think that getting more ink will bring more respect from the public to the art of magic? ...or, will it bring more fans to magic shows? ...or, will it inspire a new generation of great magicians?....or, will it just make Blaine a household word? I am interested to hear your thoughts...thanks!

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Carl Mercurio » September 23rd, 2003, 8:16 pm

I can't answer that question, Sal, because the only ink I ever got was what was in my dye tube... :p Of course, if you really want to be entertained, I hear there's this show by some guy named Todd something, Robbins I think, called Carnival Knowledge in New York City. I'm not sure, but I think it's playing at the SoHo Playhouse on Thurs., Fri, Sat (two shows), and a Sunday matinee, or something like that anyway. I hear he's a god...

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Guest » September 23rd, 2003, 8:29 pm

"Just make his name a household word"! That's all?!...That is exactly what he wants and has/is doing. Pete is right...Blaine knows exactly what he is doing, and it is paying off. How much press would polite Japanese quietly watching get? Does Japan have anything like THE SUN or THE MIRROR, who are thankful Blaine is giving them an on-going story, they can sell and return with unrelenting coverage? Watch as the tide will turn as Blaine is credited with staying with it, and the (soccer-like) hooligans become an embarrassment. Remember Evel Kneviel was hammered in England by the press and public and conquered in the end.
Blaine's critics sound very like Dr. A.M. Wilson knocking Houdini, or Mitch Miller knocking rock n roll. No one understands TV and media better than Blaine!

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Kevin Connolly » September 23rd, 2003, 9:24 pm

I just don't see the coverage here in the NYC area. It's barely a blip on the radar when it is covered on tv. And when it is, it seems like it is covered as joke. Gloria Estefan and Paul McCartney didn't seem too impressed when they came to see him. They seemed more appalled than anything else.

What I can't figure out is what do you do with "so-called" publicity? Tough to take out the road I would think.

In my opinion, the American-English culture clash will probably only grow and might really become dangerous for David Blaine. OR they could be stooges thrown in the mix to get coverage and be nothing at all.
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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Wolfgang » September 23rd, 2003, 9:41 pm

While Blaine was getting a lot of attention in the States before, he was not that well known in Europe. The media coverage he is getting in Britain is amazing as a friend tells me from there. Maybe he has to launch his book over there.....................
He does not surprise me, I always thought of him as a pretty bad magician but with a really powerful promoter in the back. Like it or not the young kids know Blaine and think he is cool. And quite frankly if a guy gets paid so well for sitting a couple days in a box than more power to him......
I am sure his promoters are laughing all the way to the bank, there is the old saying: "There is no bad press......."

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Bill Duncan » September 23rd, 2003, 11:09 pm

Originally posted by WolfgangWollet:
there is the old saying: "There is no bad press..."
Tell that to Anna Nichole Smith

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Pete Biro » September 23rd, 2003, 11:31 pm

Snipped off a Photography bbs:

just out of intrest is anyone in the states intrested in what david blaine is doing over here,i.e living in a box above the river thames with only water to drink and doing this for 44 days ! so far the british response has been to shout at him and throw eggs at his box,the tabloids have labelled him "the yank in the tank" and "the pain in the glass"(dont you just love tabioid humour).a lot of the papers have not gone to big on him because they think he is a self publists and the whole thing is both pointless and irresponsible! the biggest complaint from the photographers is that the box is hard to shoot through because of smears on it and that mr blaine just dosent do very much, he likes to sleep a lot,i went past on my way to a football match and the crowds were huge but i must admit i dont really know if i get it,maybe the thought of seeing a grown man poop into a garbage bag is thrilling to some but for me no, equally the need to throw food at a man who is starving himself also doesnt appeal and does seem more than a little cruel,so what do you chaps make of him and the british response to him?
Stay tooned.

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Carl Mercurio » September 24th, 2003, 7:48 am

Originally posted by Diego Domingo:
"Blaine knows exactly what he is doing, and it is paying off. How much press would polite Japanese quietly watching get? Does Japan have anything like THE SUN or THE MIRROR, who are thankful Blaine is giving them an on-going story, they can sell and return with unrelenting coverage?
Perhaps you're right.... :)

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Max Maven » September 24th, 2003, 1:43 pm

Originally posted by Diego Domingo:
How much press would polite Japanese quietly watching get? Does Japan have anything like THE SUN or THE MIRROR ...
Actually, there are publications in Japan that make the U.K. tabloids seem quite tame. And if ever get near an aidoru concert (or, for that matter, a kabuki performance) you'll know that Japanese audiences can be neither polite nor quiet.

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Guest » September 24th, 2003, 2:01 pm

Max,
You mean better than page 3 in THE SUN?!
Sounds good to me!

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Carl Mercurio » September 24th, 2003, 2:17 pm

Max,

I remember now when I was in Japan visiting my in-laws a couple of years ago seeing the men on the subway reading these daily or weekly sports newspapers, tabloids really. Every one had a "page 3" type of spread featuring naked women. Not that I looked, mind you. I only bought it for the articles on Sumo.... ;)

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Todd Robbins » September 24th, 2003, 2:19 pm

Carl,
The check is in the mail.

Yours Truly,
Todd Robbins*


*Star of Todd Robbins'Carnival Knowledge at the Soho Playhouse, 15 Vandam St. (between 6th Ave. & Varick, one block north of Spring St.) Take the C or E trains to Spring St and then walk north one block. Call Telecharge for tickets: 212-239-6200 and go to www.carnivalknowledge.com for more information about the show that is a behind the scenes glimpse at the twisted world of the American sideshow. A show the NY Times called, "genuinely eye-popping". It's more fun than throwing eggs at a guy living in a plexiglass box! Todd Robbins' Carnival Knowledge...see it today!

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Carl Mercurio » September 24th, 2003, 2:24 pm

Originally posted by Todd Robbins:
Carl, The check is in the mail.
What? Me plug a friend's show for personal gain? I'm shocked and appalled at the suggestion....(You know where to send the check right?)

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Sal Perrotta » September 24th, 2003, 8:40 pm

Thank you for the tip Carl! It seems to me that I have come across that name.....Todd Robbins, before. If I am correct, I vaguely remember seeing a guy with that name drive a nail up his nose to make a point that Simon Lovell was a great magician. I can't rememder the date but it somehow stands out that it might have been a monday night....

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Steve Bryant » September 25th, 2003, 7:08 pm

Great cartoon in the September 29 New Yorker. The drawing is of two people watching television. The caption reads: "Why can't David Blaine just stick himself somewhere and not involve the rest of us?"

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Jon Racherbaumer » September 26th, 2003, 6:41 am

YET ANOTHER EVANESCENT BLURB TO BE IMMEDIATELY FORGOTTEN:

Alack and alack, there is a Celebrity Culture, primarily driven by television and film. The tabloids also pump up the volume. Once one is famous for being famous, almost anything that primes, prods, and polarizes celeb watchers works.

Once again, Blaine knows what Houdini knew or intuited: "Performance is about the AUDIENCE," not the person or even the event itself. The press now reports what the audience is speculating, doing, thinking, reacting...and so on...There are reactions of reactions of reactions and so on...

Other fame-seeking magicians, at least at first, were dumbfounded at Blaine's success. Some still are...

Yet few magicians are able to enter and STAY in any Celebrity Culture.

Blaine has been in all kinds of media: MTV videos, GQ fashion shoots, television cartoons (South Park, as a character), commercials (to come), ads, cartoons (in the New Yorker, no less), in Esquire, Rolling Stone, and countless glossy magazines, has a best-selling book, film development deals...The beat goes on...The money rolls in...

There will soon be other stunts and novels (ABOUT him or BASED on him)...The beat goes on...

We watch, astonished. He squires and beds pedigree hotties and other famous-for-being famous women...

He hangs with other celebs...He is on most A-lists...

At this date, he is the most well-known (globally) magician since Houdini...

People can also pronounce and spell his name. More important, they REMEMBER it...

All this about a personality that does NOT work any of the usual venues most magicians are seeking to fill and be known for...

Onward...

Guest

Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Guest » September 26th, 2003, 8:21 am

At the moment.
I rather fear that if he comes down before his time in abject humiliation the press (especially the British Press) will eat him alive and that will be the end of his career.
Kaput.
He had better stick it out.

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Guest » September 26th, 2003, 8:26 am

Mr. Jon. Exactly right.

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Robert Allen » September 26th, 2003, 8:55 am

To me, the fascinating thing about all this is his publicists referring to Blaine as a "brand". Do Copperfields people refer to Copperfield as a "brand"?

This whole "brand" BS is IMHO a sign of whats wrong with America today. It's all about branding. Selling. Doesn't matter what you're selling, as long as you control the brand. Sigh.

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Sal Perrotta » September 26th, 2003, 9:16 am

Thank you very much Mr. Racherbaumer for taking the time to make such an interesting and insightful post on this thread. I would like to hear more on your definition of success.

It appears from your posting that you define success as how much media attention one receives, whether one is on the celebrity A list, how much name recognition one has with the public and how much money one makes, and whether you will be remembered by the general public after you have departed this earth. If that is it, then it appears that someone like Dia Vernon was not very successful.

Do you think that there should be a reference to magic in the definition of success? Should there be a mention of originality in presentation or in adding to the stock of new tricks, sleights etc.?
What about inspiring new or existing magicians? How about bringing respect to the art of magic and increasing the fans of magic among the general population?

If you consider some of these questions would you consider David Blaine and this latest stunt a success? My own observation of the British public is that they appear to be reacting with contempt and confusion. Some people I know over there have asked me the question...WHY is he doing this? They do not seem to see any connection to "magic" in this stunt...

And since you have made a reference to HOUDINI...there is the story of many escapes in which HOUDINI actually got out of whatever he was in within the first few moments and sat for a while reading the newspaper because he knew that the effect on the viewer would be the greatest when their anticipation, concern etc. were not immediately satisfied. Tension grew as there was genuine concern about the safety in the sometimes apperent life and death struggle within the escape. Thus, the maximum amount of emotional reaction and effect on the viewer could be acheived....creating the greatest excitement. That was true showmanship! Can you compare that to the indifferent and confused public reaction to David Blaine sitting in a plexiglass box? Or is it really only HOUDINI'S successful mastery of publicity that is similiar? Could it be that the story of David Blaine potentially quiting is really part of the act to help focus the veiwer on the potential real or imagined peril he is in?

.........I am interested in hearin your further thoughts on success. Thanks for taking the time to read this!

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Guest » September 26th, 2003, 10:11 am

I received an email from an associate in the UK, a non-magician, and he asked about Blaine. He said that very few are causing a ruckus and a couple women have flashed (some English term that I've forgotten) at him but that the vast majority find it interesting. Seems like, much like the US press, they are looking for the negative and pounding on that.
Steve V

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Guest » September 26th, 2003, 11:04 am

Jon is perfectly right on the money.

Yes, success in the REAL world of showbusiness is all and more of what Jon notes. Copperfield on the cover of ESQUIRE with Claudia...who Blaine is dating...Those who figured out a new card move, I'm sure a mention in the next "Ring Report" will make you very happy.
Vernon may not have wanted Blaine's type of success, preferring to be a success in his genre/world...or perhaps few would have thought a magician doing close-up magic, could be a STAR.
No one succeeded in "elevating the art of magic", UNLESS they elevated/promoted themselves (a brand)as the commodity. It is individual personalities that have driven people to buy tickets. Would you leave the house to hear "the art singing", OR to hear Whitney, Bennett, or___?
NO ONE understands Houdini and the media better than Blaine. Not just a jump into the Thames that gets a day of press, but now weeks/months of press, without touching the river!
The best definition of what made Houdini, is in the first paragraph in Blaine's book, in his chapter on Houdini....he describes a man who performed many wonderful and dangerous escapes, an amazing performer...and his name was....MURRY.
That will not happen to Blaine...some need to be famous, he cannot, NOT be famous.
Blaine knows what he is doing, (as planned) and doing it well.

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Bob Walder » September 26th, 2003, 11:26 am

If anyone is still interested I can give you a Brit's view on this stunt.

In a nutshell, the self-publicity thing that seems to get a lot of Americans excited (that's not intended as a racial slur, just an general observation/generalisation from the other side of the Pond) does not sit well with your average Brit. It was also not helped by the other stunt where he tried to make out he was balancing himself on the top of one of the cabins on the London Eye for a complete revolution, when it was painfully apparent in numerous pictures that he was secured by a safety rope disappearing up his trouser leg!

Stiff upper lips and all that are there to stop us making fools of ourselves by going on a 44 day fast in a plastic tank suspended over a river. If he had tried standing on top of Nelson's column for 35 hours we would have knocked him off it with eggs (or something harder) within the first hour!

Proud of it? Not at all - behaviour like that is one of the reasons I moved to France

Toodle pip old bean - I'm off to stiffen me upper lip, don't yer know

Bob ;)

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Guest » September 26th, 2003, 11:37 am

I actually knew Murray quite well. His most famous escape was pure bluff, I have reason to believe. He was supposed to have jumped out of a plane in a straight jacket and have escaped in time to pull the ripcord of the parachute.

I cannot remember who told me - perhaps it was Murray himself although I doubt it- that the old devil just bribed the pilot to say it happened.
Audacity and Bluff was Murray's motto. He had plenty of it. You should have seen him short change his customers in his magic shop.

Talking about bluff I know an amazing hypnotist in Ireland who pulled off a publicity stunt and got nearly as much publicity as David Blaine over just as many weeks and he didn't have to sit in an uncomfortable box starving either.

Paul Goldin was a legendary stage hypnotist who has now retired and become a hypnotherapist. 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. Something like David Blaine.

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.

I rather think David Blaine should study Paul Goldin instead of Houdini.

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Matthew Field » September 26th, 2003, 12:12 pm

Originally posted by Sal Perrotta:
It appears from your posting that you define success as how much media attention one receives,. . .
You might take note of the fact that Jon starts his post with the following: "Alack and alack."

He's not defining anything other than the unfortunate zeitgeist of our sadly declining age.

Matt Field

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Guest » September 26th, 2003, 2:06 pm

Dumb question time. After this period of offending the stiff lipped Brits is Blaine going to come down during a new TV special or is this just keeping his name in the news?
Steve V

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Guest » September 26th, 2003, 2:12 pm

Angelic,
Have also heard wonderful things about Murry, but just as many have jumped their motorcycles longer and higher than Evel Kneivel,
people still remember him. A lot of performers have bent keys, but only Geller is known for it.
REGARDING PAUL GOLDIN:
I remember seeing him perform his show in San Francisco, over 30 years ago, and he called it ESP, would not say it was hypnotism....a good show, very entertaining. Do you recall him being involved in some difficulty in the early 1970's?
I always wondered what happened to him.

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Jon Racherbaumer » September 26th, 2003, 3:18 pm

Splitting and Lumping On The Way to the Forum:

Clarification Point: I was specifically talking about and defining success in Celeb Culture, Pop Culture, or what others now call No-Brow Culture or what Nabokov called Poshlast.

McLuhan saith: "Art is anything you can get away with..."

Art + commerce = suck-cess. See film titled "Modern Art" or read the book titled, REALITY AIN'T WHAT IT USED TO BE.

Success?
What sells. $$$$
This is what made Sammy run. This is what drove Col. Sanders and Col. Tom Parker. This is why Elvis left the building....forever...
This is why Lisa Marie is buying the building.

This of course is NOT my aesthetic, philosophy, or value system. In the current cultural system of values measuring success, someone like Dai Vernon would not measure up.

The list is long...

Adam Sandler is a huge success and makes more $$$$ than Jim Carrey. Is "Anger Management" worth watching anywhere besides an airplane?

Britney Spears?
J-Ho?

Betting back to Blaine, I consider the Starvation Subjugation Skit a "happening."

However, the subject of "success" and how it is defined is a lively one.
Keep the comments coming...

Onward...

Guest

Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Guest » September 26th, 2003, 3:18 pm

Paul was always getting into "difficulty" Not just the early seventies either.
Part of the legend. And he is indeed a legend.

He never mentioned the word hypnosis in his show. He implied it was mind control of some sort.
I have a poster of his in front of me now as I write this. It says "ESP? PARANORMAL? OCCULT?
SO WHAT IS IT? SEE FOR YOURSELF.....THE AMAZING WORLD OF PAUL GOLDIN!!!!

He changed my life to a degree. I bumped into him in a Dublin department store. He said to me "I don't know why you don't do stage hypnotism. You have the Chudspah for it" For those of you that don't know "Chudspah" (sometimes spelt "Hudspeh" in North America) means the quality that would enable a man who murdered his parents to ask the court for leniency on the grounds that he is an orphan. In other words, sheer nerve.

I thought about this and decided that if one of the greatest and most legendary stage hypnotists of the twentieth century tells me that I should be doing stage hypnosis then I had better go about learning it. And I did.

I first heard about him when I was about 16 years old. I was in Wales visiting my uncle who was a medical doctor. He said to me "you do magic. Have you ever heard of Paul Goldin?" I said "No. Is he a magician?" My uncle said "no. He is a stage hypnotist. I used to go to medical school with him. He became a hypnotist, and got into trouble with one of his shows in England and fled to Ireland"
Lo and behold about 30 or so years later I met Paul Goldin in Ireland and told him about my uncle. He said "Oh, Louie. He always told me that I should never have given up medicine"
I got to know him a little after that and it was quite a number of years later that he told me to become a hypnotist.

He told me something about hypnosis that was quite a shock to me. I cannot reveal what it was since Paul is still around and practicing as a hypnotherapist in Dublin. He would be in his seventies, now I imagine. I got the impression that he did not want the secret revealed so I will bite my usual garrulous tongue.

I only say him perform once. It was one hell of a lesson in promotion, nerve and showmanship. It was in a theatre. A long show with an intermission. My critical magician's mind thought that the show was a bit long and dragged. Then he said something which changed my mind. He said "do you realise that you have been watching me for THREE HOURS and you are still transfixed by all this?" I looked around and saw people with their eyes wide with wonder, women with jaws dropping at what they had seen and people sitting literally at the edge of their seats hardly moving.

I realised then that this was some showman.After the show people were talking about him in hushed tones as if he was some sort of God. Sometimes the show was funny certainly but I think spine chilling would be a better description.

Paul has always been a bit of a rogue though. All sorts of escapades of his in the press.

To show you what sort of a rogue he was he had about 7 people on stage in trance. He then said "I am now going to say an ancient Hindustani mantra to put these people even deeper"
To my horror he said "yiskadal, veyishkadash,shemay rabbo" and so on and so on. To those who are not Jewish I had better explain that he was reciting "kaddish" over his subjects. This is one of the most sacred prayers in the Jewish religion and is a prayer for the dead.

Lucky that there are only 2000 Jews in Ireland.

A great rogue and showman.

Guest

Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Guest » September 26th, 2003, 4:23 pm

Angelic,
Thanks for the great stories! If you have contact with him, sounds like Goldin could write a quite a book, just listening to him "cutting up jackpots" with him, must of been something. The "Kaddish" story is a hoot!

Guest

Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Guest » September 26th, 2003, 5:13 pm

"Cutting up jackpots" is an interesting expression. Are you "with it"?

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Guest » September 26th, 2003, 7:18 pm

"and FOR it!"

(Have worked with Pete Kortes, Ward & Chris, and more.)

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Re: Blaine To Quit?

Postby Guest » September 27th, 2003, 8:41 am

Aha! Now I understand.
For those of you who do not know what we are talking about I can only say that you are "without it"
You may be better off "without" it too. If you are "with" it it may well be the road to rack and ruin.
Incidentally Vernon was "with it" even though magicians are under the impression that he was "without" it.
Even though David Blaine is technically "without it" I think he could almost be "with it". Actually he is better off "without it" I think.
More money that way.

I think I and Diego had better go before we confuse everybody.


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