Jan 10 2009
Nuts & Bolts - My Love / Hate Affair With Card Tricks
I think I’ve mentioned here that I tend to perform at Renaissance Faires and the like - as such, it’s not easy to do card tricks.*
Well, you can do card tricks, but since I was trained to be Historically Neutral if not Historically Accurate, most of the card tricks you’ll see on TV are not in fact available to me. Why? Because they rely on the size and shape of modern playing cards. Back in the day, most playing cards weren’t as thin or the same size as a standard “poker” deck of cards - heck, it wasn’t until the 17th Century or so that the suits of playing cards were standardized, and that was done by the French!
So, I didn’t do card tricks at Renaissnace Faires.
I also didn’t do card tricks outside of Renaissance Faires. In fact, for 6 of the 8 or so years I’ve been doing this stuff for money, I didn’t do much in the way of card tricks at all. Partially because I didn’t really like doing them, and partially (and my ego says primarily) because every magician on God’s Green Earth does card tricks. In fact, many of your casual acquaintances do card tricks - and card tricks are very very easy to do very very badly.
I didn’t want to be that person, y’see.
Well, fastwind to more recent days, and I find myself in posession of about five card tricks I know and am very happy with. And friends…
Five Tricks Makes A Routine
And A Routine Can Make A Career
The toughest part of finding tricks I like have to do with suitability to my own skills, character and performing environment. Some stuff is staggering in its effect, but requires so much preparation and “reset” that it’s impractical (my friend Trey touches on this over at Out Of The Ordinary - Caution: Strong Language and Magician Rage) .
For me, I have short, thick, sausage like fingers. A standard size playing card can juuuust about hide behind my meat-patty like mitt. Not the kind of hands one would expect Awesome Card Manipulation from.
On top of that, who the heck expects a guy with a name like “Tobias the Adequate” to be brilliant at card tricks? Not me, I can tell you!
However, because I kept looking, and searching, I found, at first, 2 tricks I liked. Then a third, and a fourth… and a fifth. And now I have a nice little card routine which I can bust out if the need or desire arises. Each one is a bit more “impossible” than the one before it, ending up with my plucking a card out of someone’s mind without any clear indication of how I got the information.
It’ll be a darn site easier to tote than all that rope, I’ll wager.
Oh, and as a side note - one of those five tricks will be making a debut in my RenFaire show. On Renaissance-looking playing cards.
addendum - There will be a page coming into existance discussing Five Tricks You Can Turn Into A Career once I get some research and vetting done on the sources for these tricks. I want to give credit where credit is due, you see…
* I know, there are RenFaire performers who do card tricks with modern playing cards and they haven’t been run out of town. Well, they’re them and I’m me…
I don’t care for card trick for many of the same reasons you stated. I also consider Card tricks the Nascar of Magic. Pick a card. Reveal a card. Pick a card. Reveal a card. Repeat, repeat, aaaaand rinse.
And yet, I too have my pet tricks which work with my Tobias like hands.
I hate pulling out the cards because as you stated almost everyone knows one. and they are more than will to share that knowlege.
So to keep the focus of my show I shy away from the cards.