In Tonight’s episode,

Sweden's Magic double act, Brynolf and Ljung, perform 'The World's Most Difficult' - and painful - card trick. – Did Fool P & T

Colin McLeod – Mentalist reads the studio audience's mind,[bookless book test ] - Did Not Fool P & T

Gazzo Standard Cups and Balls (as P & T have also performed this for years not surprising that he did not fool them with this Trick)

Keelan Leyser and Charlotte Marie demonstrate their Quick Change Act – Did Not Fool them

P and T end Item

Great Show This week

I doubt Gazzo went on the show to try & fool them. He probably did it for the exposure, the TV credit and an update to his promo video.

Same goes for a quick change act regards publicity me thinks.

Where is the best place to chat this show? What station? Or on the net?

Thanks!

John

On youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PiioVIvGiEY

I think there are a lot of acts, certainly not all, that are going on there purely for exposure, which I understand why they are doing it, and in a way wish I had gone on there as I would have gone on with something in an attempt to fool them, however, the title of the show does sort of give it away, and I just feel some acts have gone on there to fool the audience and not Penn and Teller and gain exposure.

The show provides artists with some of the best reel footage they will EER have. It respects magicians even gven the premise of the show, aswell.

What moe can one ask?

I think you would have knocked them for six based on some of the rubbish that has been shown.

Hope to see you on the 2nd series.

Andi

p.s. To anyone reading this, Chris has one of the best DVDs available. It's a few years old but still brilliant. Get it before one of the tricks gets you!

I might book up and perform Get Sharky. That's the type of magic that audiences want to see. Direct and to the point.

Where might I learn more about "pantomime" technique in mentalism?

If there was no switch with the card trick that fooled them, he should have not did such a poor job hiding the card for a second at the end. Unless they did that to mess with them.

I still think there was a switch.

Agreed, a switch took place, otherwise the trick was real magic

There was no switch, I actually know how it is done.
I think that they wanted to make them think that they did a switch to cover the real secret.

He flashed a palmed card before removing the folded one from the tweezers, it's either these guys used bizarrely pointless nuance to throw Penn and Teller off or there was a switch. However, I'm fairly certain that the show doesn't go simply on the magician's word... they must have some way of knowing for sure because it's extremely easy to lie.

I also disagree with the acts that go on the show purely for exposure... there's no way in the world these magicians should think their acts would fool Penn and Teller, or really any knowledgable magician. For instance, the quick change and Gazzo's routine... both wonderful acts, I've seen Gazzo live on the streets and the routine is killer. But come on... you don't even have to be Penn and Teller to know the methods. These acts are just wasting time. I'm sure the lay audiences won't know the difference, but when I see a magician come out to do a quick change act, I'm very tempted to want to skip past. As a magician, I watch the show to be fooled myself, not to watch magic. There have also been times on the show where Penn and Teller guess a method and the magician onstage proves them wrong using tricky wordplay. If they just put a little extra thought into what was being said, they would be led right to where they need to be. For instance, the double act of magicians who did the mentalism routine with celebrity names... Penn and Teller guessed a deck switch, but the magicians ruled that out by saying "We handed Johnathan the cards he shuffled in the order he shuffled them". Within seconds I knew exactly what that meant.

I'm sure some acts may be up there for the 15 minutes of fame.

I think we also have to accept that the show is made for the general Saturday night family viewing public - and just not for magicians. Of course performers are going on for the (massive) exposure it brings - and if they are good, quality performers then why not? Clearly the line up is padded with some normal / average performers to make the good ones stand out. If all of the performances fooled P&T then what would that say about them and how big would the bill for flight tickets to Vegas be?! I think it is great to have some high quality magic back on prime time TV. This with Dynamo's current excellent TV series (Channel WATCH - SKY 109 Thurday evenings 9.00pm) it can only do good. And lets be honest after the BBC's truly dreadful 'The Magicians' series we need it!

Impressive that you know there wasn't a switch when it looked like there was a Mercury card folded in hand at the end. I have to watch this again a few more times, but I think as Michael said some magicians are trying to take advantage of subtleties of the wording Penn & Teller use. Some will undoubtedly be going to Vegas who perhaps never really fooled them.

For those who do "win" at the end like the Swedish, I assume that they must need to go over the actual methods with the show's producer's or Penn & Teller (or the show judge) to confirm that the "fool" is legit? And what night happen if the fool was not legit?

As fas as I am aware: each contestant must reveal the method to Johnny Thompson (The Great Thompsoni -who has a vast knowledge of all genres of magic) and he ensures that they stick to that method for the actual filming. If P & T are sure they know the method, but if the contestant disagrees -- as we have seen; P & T accept that they have guessed wrong. Were the contestant to lie to P & T, Thompson would intervene.

Peter

There was really no card switch. If you want to know how it is done just send me a pm.
I'm pretty sure they make it look like a switch on purpose just make it look like the real method for magicians. Many magicians have done that. Last week show, the two guys also pretended to do a deck switch on purpose just to throw Penn and Teller off.

Here's the secret to fool Penn and Teller with a card trick:
Just use a stack deck or a marked deck.
False shuffle and pretend to do a riffle force (this move is obvious for magicians), but actually don't force any card. At this pont you already know their card, if you glimpse the bottom card (stack deck). Then have the card place back and pretend to do a glimpse (don't do any glimpse, just pretend). Then pretend that you are using a key card, so let Penn and Teller just cut the cards, not shuffle. Take the deck back and look for the selected card and reveal it. Tadaa!
There is no way that they can know which method you used. So, here is your free trip to Las Vegas.

My point is that there are hundreds of methods to accomplish the same trick. And I think many partipants are taking advantage of this.
Some examples: John Archer, Ben Earln, Jon Allan, the Swedish guys, and many others that I don't remember now.
John Archer's Bank Night can be accomplished with many different methods as clean as he did, and the result is the same.

There should be a rule where the trick does not fool Penn and Teller if: they can figure out the trick OR if they can find a method to accomplish the same trick as clean as the performance or cleaner.