Kinda depends on the performing character. Is the intent to be believed or perhaps to distract with laughter?

Patter must always match the character that is using it. The reason Color Monte is so clever and broad in application is that virtually ANYONE 'could' have been walking along and seen a 'guy' doing the ole Three Card Monte, etc. But, if one wants to be believed AS a person that tossed Monte at some point as a career choice then the performer must be believed so that he can extract the maximum from the routine displayed if that's the context that he is working from.

It is of course possible to frame the character as someone who has 'studied' the work of the 'cheat' and thus the display of skill will follow a somewhat more didactic course. Best,

I can't understand why people still get hung up on "lying." If you watch a movie, all the actors are "lying." They really aren't who they are pretending to be.

When kids are playing, are they lying when they pretend to be cowboys/indians/cops/robbers, etc? If yes, is it bad to lie?

Penn & Teller will tell you they are lying (at least Penn will), and then they tell you how they do a trick, and then magicians get all upset because they didn't lie.

Of course, the lie has to match your personality. If you are fifteen years old and say that you learned something from a swami while traveling through India, it may be a bit farfetched.

Acting and lying could be considered the same thing. If you are lying to hurt someone, I don't recommend it. If you are lying to entertain someone, go for it. That's my opinion. (Or is it?)

I think for me Misdirection is a part of the act, when you say you are putting a card in the centre of the deck does it really go there? Is that a lie or misdirection?

Telling a “Story” about uncle Fred as a part of the routine is that a lie or entertainment?

A lie to me is to make people believe you have done things you know you have not, by me saying I was in Vegas or New York doing this magic would be a lie.

I feel if you lie to boost your own ego or give a false representation of yourself that’s wrong , but while performing I think most people know it’s a story or misdirection.

Take care all

I am not hung up on it. I just wanted to know what some of the members do with their patter. In my original post I used embellish as well as lie. Story telling is a spoken art that is lost today.
My grandfather and I used to go dump to hunt for a blue eyed bear. (we would set in the car) We seen many bears, but never a blue eyed bear. It was great fun watching the bears. And looking for one blue eyes made me want to come back every time we went to grand ma and grand pa’s.
I have felt the “magic of a well told story” as much as I have seen a trick with my eyes.

When I do "Come Fly With Me" (3 fly). I tell the story of how my grandfather used to collect coins, and as a young boy I used to love to examine his silver dollars. All true. I then say that when he died, he left me three Morgan Silver Dollars, a total lie. I then tell them about how I wanted to come up with an incredible trick to do with them. . It personalizes the effect, and makes for a great lead in to the effect. I feel no guilt.

Perry I love doing a story while performing magic, most of the time I just make it up as I go along. I think it’s more common in the UK to story tell while performing but still I believe it’s a dying art.
I am not a pro so story telling gives me a chance to get my double or pinkie break, go into my pocket for a pen things like that. However you do need to break from the story in order to get the attention back on the trick or they lose the plot of the trick and want to know more about the story lol

Take care all

I would describe my patter as T. Sebastian did......I weave fact and (plausible) fiction. I have a routine where I use my grandmothers button jar and some fabric of hers. The rest of the story is fiction....but plausible. My character on stage is one of humor. Do you really think that everything that happens to comedians really happens to them. Its part of the roll we play. Just like actors in Hollywood.

People like stories--they find them entertaining, and they don't necessarily have to be true to be fun. I've found that when I have a compelling story to tell, people are much more interested in the magic. Of course, you need to tell a GOOD story. Look at Joshua Jay's Vegas Visit--a six card repeat effect. Now you could do this by saying "Look 6 cards. Let me deal some off. Hey look there are still 6 cards. Deal a few more off; hey there's still 6. Crazy!" But that wouldn't be nearly as entertaining as the tale that's told as part of that routine--and it's pretty obvious that the story isn't true, but that doesn't detract from the magic, in fact, it's probably a better routine BECAUSE the story is unbelievable.

I'm with Gaddy. I lie, even when I don't have to.

In a related topic: Gaddy, have I told you that you look good in your avatar?

I suppose people like moral quandaries, I don't. Anyway, I've never met an honest person.

I'm of the school that considers a magician to be an actor. It's too bad that I have to write my own script, since I'm not the best playwright in the world, but since I don't have the money to pay anyone else to do it for me...

In that context, a performance is very much like a play. The actor plays a character, and the audience goes along with it (assuming that it's interesting). Is that lying? It's certainly a work of fiction at some level, but the audience is also in on the idea that there is at least a bit of fiction involved. Although fiction is technically lying, since it isn't reciting facts, it still holds a place in the human psyche that is somewhat apart from lying in my opinion.

And, yeah. I lie all the time
Bill

There is an easy way to view this...

Magicians are actors playing magicians (that can act) <<< read that over and over

When you watch an actor playing superman, you know its not true. It is entertainment. That is the same with magic... however the story plot is to make the audience WANT to BELIEVE it is TRUE. <<< your job as the actor (not the magician)

In the end, truth is nothing more than perception. Belief is what gives truth reality. Actors play on this every day.

The magic is the script that lets us, as magicians, act out the plot.

"In the end, truth is nothing more than perception. Belief is what gives truth reality. Actors play on this every day." -mmreed

Years ago a friend related the story of being in Hawaii sitting on a hill overlooking the ocean. He had imbibed a particularly virulent form of 'magic' mushroom and was experiencing....hmmm....a form of reality displacement. He 'perceived' a charge of Knights upon horses riding down upon him with long lances. One lance pierced his head and my friend 'thought' that he had been killed. Time passed and wonder of wonders he was not in fact sans forehead and most of the rest of his skull, etc. (This experience put my friend off drugs for pretty much the rest of his life!)

If the epistemological statement above was in fact 'true' my friend 'should' have died.

It's much like the self-negating epistemological stance: Seeing is believing! The problem with that statement is that the supposed truth that 'Seeing is believing' is not itself a 'truth' that you can 'see'.

Belief doesn't make anything true at all. My wife is a Dr. of Psychology. She has met folks that REALLY believe that they are JFK, Jesus, etc. They really believe it, but it's not so. They are still Mike Roberts or whoever.

If what is meant by the original statement above is that if one 'believes' in the part one is playing then it will add a layer of verisimilitude to the character that is being portrayed, then I heartily agree. This is what I have talked up as the "Magic State of Mind". Fake placing a coin from right to left hand and when the left hand is opened to find the coin gone the 'effect' is that it vanished in some manner. If while one is making the move necessary to so 'vanish' the coin one adds the thought that "he is REALLY placing the coin" in the left hand, then body language conviction will add to the illusion. Best,