magic on TV Archives

Is Magic in Bad Shape or is NOW the Golden Age for Magicians?

Is magic ina bad shape? What's the future of magic

Magicians love to complain about the state of magic today, always harking back to the golden age of magic. Everything it seems, is going downhill. The new generation of magicians are ruining magic as an art. But is that really the case? Maybe this is the greatest time in history for magic – a new golden age:

But now everyone is doing magic tricks.

Years ago it was harder to find, and learn a magic tricks secret. Only the committed were encouraged or had the drive to learn the ‘inner secrets’. Now that magic has developed into a more mainstream activity, all those people with drive STILL find magic today. The difference is that they are not slowed down by gatekeepers, or lack of access to knowledge.

It’s true that many more casual magicians can now also dabble in magic, but the effort to master a performance to the level of an expert isn’t there. They drop out of magic quickly. The result:

The same amount of committed, driven people take the time to excel and develop their skills.

Perhaps even more, as commitment has become the barrier rather than accessibility. There is a much larger casual/hobby following, but they drop out of performing over time. They remain fans of magic, and appreciate watching magic. That feeds the audience for those that stay the course.

Does price and availability matter?

The availability and price of magic doesn’t impact the quality of magicians. In just the same way that the quality of professional singers isn’t damaged by the fact that songs are free to sing. It’s talent that’s important, the increased popularity of magic increases the number of talented magicians that can emerge. The poor quality acts also increase but don’t gain an audience.

But terrible magicians on Youtube are putting people off magic.

There have been terrible magicians all through history. There have also been terrible singers, artists, authors and actors. Amateur dramatics is not killing cinema, just like karaoke isn’t hurting the music industry. We are not put off by the terrible audition acts when we watch Britains got Talent or X-Factor. We love the show more because of it. There’s a saying: The sour makes the sweet taste sweet.

Badly presented magic on youtube is low quality and just like anything else, there’s always going to be lots of it. It makes us appreciate the real talent the ‘diamond in the rough’. There’s a huge amount of excellent magic on YouTube in amongst the poor stuff. There’s just as much bad comedy, art, dance too, but the good stuff is filtered through and shared.

Poor quality YouTube videos don’t fool us, we all know their status. Some people learn a little from them whilst others get inspired to explore magic themselves, but most people dismiss or ignore them.

Awful Youtube magic videos need to exist. They have a purpose. It’s the modern version of the uncle who bores you to death with his shambolic magic tricks. You can judge good magic against it.

It wasn’t any better.

We view the past through rose tinted glasses. Were the magicians props and tricks over the last 100 years any better than those today? More expensive and harder to order, yes, but quality? Browse through any magic shop website and pick out all the items you think are terrible and you wouldn’t ever be seen using. What percentage of them have been around for decades?

The stereotypical magician is not new.

Magic had a negative stereotype far before the Internet came along. The magicians that are mocked are dressed and use props from the time before magic became so commercial. We mocked unpracticed magicians then, and we still do now. Nothing has changed. What we are really mocking is lack of practice, presentation and skill. Those shortcomings have been ridiculed all through history.

Tommy Copper used magic for the sake of comedy. He did it with love, but its clear he understood completely how magicians were mocked by the public in the 1970’s and he based his persona on the popular stereotype of the clumsy magician who’s tricks go wrong. People tuned in to be made to laugh as much as to enjoy his magic tricks. His persona allowed the audience to laugh AT him knowing they were also laughing WITH him.

TV Magic has gone downhill.

The 1960’s 1980’s and 1970’s, what some refer to as the golden age were not filled with amazing magic TV shows any more than today. Yes, we can name some great shows, but magic on TV was still rare, compared to any other type of program. There were great magicians on TV then and there are great magicians inspiring and amazing viewers today. TV shows have had to change their format over the years as TV magicians have to deal with a different way that the audience watches their shows. We can now record, rewind and repeat shows as much as we want, this isn’t a reflection on the quality of magic presented, but more an adaption to the way audiences interact with it.

The shows are different, but magic is still loved, hated and ignored as much as ever. Many of the changes we see in the way TV presents magic, are happening across all forms on entertainment. Chat with entertainers in any form and you get the same concerns over the format and presentation. It’s not magic that’s changed, it’s TV and audience tastes in general.

The golden age of magic VS. Selective recall.

Every generation feels that things have gone downhill, and that things were better in the past. This has more to do with growing older than historical fact. People don’t like or trust change and hark back to a “simpler, better time”. Psychologists have demonstrated that human memory is hard wired to remember positive events more than negative. It’s just the same with magic. The magicians in the 19th Century probably longed for a return to the golden age of magic, just as we are drawn to do so today.

Magic Today.

Despite how it may seem, magic has never been more popular at any time in history. There are an incredible number of creative people passionate about magic.

Right now, as you read this, magic shows are being broadcast on TV channels all over the world. Thousands of people are watching magic and searching for it online.

Our ability to learn and develop our skills and to push the boundaries of what is possible for magicians had never been greater.

The huge number of amateur magicians learning and exploring magic isn’t its undoing, it’s a signal that magic is alive and well, staying current and perhaps in a new golden age.

Ben Earl – Trick Artist – The Show, the Magician, and the Magic Tricks

by Merchant of Magic 2 Comments

Ben Earl - Trick Artist - His Magic Tricks

Ben Earl – Trick Artist will broadcast on

Channel 4 at 9pm, Friday 26 April 2013

As a supplier of magic tricks to Ben Earl, The Merchant of Magic is excited about the new TV release. The series is, at it’s core, a magic show. However, Ben Earl – Trick Artist will also build in creative thinking, sleight of hand and some stunning stunts.

There will be four shows in the first Ben Earl series. Each presenting magic tricks around it’s own topic: art, science, crime and money. The first show centres on crime.

The motivation behind Ben Earl – Trick Artist.

The idea is to create a magic show that is distinctive from much of the magic tricks shown on television. By using creativity and art, the show hopes to express the uniqueness of Ben Earl and his magic tricks style, which is sleight of hand based:

Ben Earl – : ‘It’s a really tricky thing but I think initially there’s a question of format, the visuals and style and all that kind of stuff. For me it’s also a different form of experience and expertise. What I do is so predominantly sleight of hand based but comes from a creative place. We’ve been able to write very ambitious and creative scenes and then inform that through a skill set that is slightly different from other guys.’

What’s featured in Ben Earl – Trick Artist.

In the footsteps of David Blaine, the Ben Earl series will feature invited guests that Ben Earl will amaze with his magic tricks and the show will build up to an ambitious and dangerous stunt. The word from the production company is that it will include Jumping off a building, climbing over moving cars and Ben Earl setting himself on fire. Each stunt is built into a larger story to create a theme for each episode.
Ben Earl also claims he will perform a bullet catch magic trick in one of the shows, some magic with a venus fly trap and a set routine built on the theme of his heart beat.

The shows will also feature some magic tricks performed to children. Ben Earl will take a very popular magicians theme: Using chocolate coins to perform coin magic tricks, and show how he likes to perform this. As many close up magicians already use chocolate coins during their close up magic shows, it will be of interest to see what new ideas he will bring to the subject.

How Ben Earl practices his magic.

Like all professional magicians Ben Earl continues to practice and perfect his technique. Although Ben won’t be using it in the show, he is a keen practitioner of contact juggling. He claims that it enhances his timing, touch, technique and control.

Ben Earl – ‘Your hands and your body are learning a relationship between themselves, a little secret language about balance, speed and timing. I spend a lot of hours partially mentally rehearsing but a lot time physically rehearsing timings, moves, pieces of sleight of hand, I just never stop practicing.’

The Ben Earl – Trick Artist series is has been commissioned by C4 Entertainment Commissioning Editor, Madeleine Knight and the 4 one hour shows were made by Magnum Media.

How Ben Earl got noticed.

Ben Earl first came into the public eye after his appearance on Penn and Teller – Fool Us. The hit show, now sadly dropped by the TV networks was very popular with magicians and general public. Ben Earl was one of the highlights of the TV show. He went on to release several magic DVD’s teaching many of his techniques and methods. The most popular of his magic DVD’s being Ben Earl – Past Midnight

In the past, magicians that have been commissioned to produce TV shows tend to discontinue their instructional magic tricks DVD’s and guides. This removal of magic secrets is often from personal preference as their popularity grows or on the insistence of their management. It remains to be seen if the Ben Earl training DVD’s for magicians will continue to be available as the show becomes popular.

Sources: C4

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How to Do Magic Tricks on TV – Live or Set Up?

by Merchant of Magic 2 Comments

A magician called Yif recently posted videos on YouTube, which many of the magic community felt were simply full of camera tricks. Magicians have discussed this in depth on magic forums and debated if the magic video was filmed with stooges and set up off camera. So, do you feel that magic on TV should only be performed in the same way a magician could perform it in live conditions?

The problems magicians face on TV.
MoveMonkey in Detroit makes a good point: Unlike at a live performance of magic, audiences watching a trick on TV or YouTube have the power to REWIND. They can enjoy infinite viewing of the performance. This destroys many of the techniques magicians use in live magic:

False-memory.
Misdirection.
Change blindness.
Forced perspective.
Intersecting moments.
Psychological influence.

One of the golden rules of how to do magic tricks, is broken when a trick is recorded:

Never repeat a trick
Once a trick – Twice a lesson comes into play here. It’s pretty easy for viewers to back-engineer a trick they watch on YouTube if they really want to.

Are magic tricks on TV a problem?
I’ve often wondered why so many magicians insist that magic on TV should only be performed the way it would be if performed ‘live’. We don’t insist singers only release live recordings without sound processing. We also don’t insist all TV shows are recorded theatre plays.

I’ve no idea if the tricks Yif performs use stooges. To be honest, I don’t really care.

THREE WINS:

1) If someone watches the video and is entertained, it’s done it’s job.

2) If that makes someone more likely to book a magician to see some live magic at their event, that’s great for us!

3) If it inspires a beginner to start the journey into magic, that’s great for him and the magic community.

Regardless of the material being live magic or staged magic, the footage can still help us learn how to do magic tricks. Just like a singer can learn something from a processed pop song. Yif does not rush the presentation, and allows the reactions to grow well after the magic has been performed. We can take from that and find ways to apply it to our own presentations.

What do you think? Please share your thoughts about magic tricks on trick in the comments section below.