Penn Jillette condemns David Blaine... What do you think?

[WitchDocIsIn]

And you are free to do as you wish, yes.

I will say, I've never gotten the idea that P&T tell people how to think. They express their own opinions. They express those opinions with passion, but I do not recall a time when they have said you should agree with them.

I do recall an interview with Penn where he talked about someone giving him a Bible, and he thanked them profusely for their concern for him. He also said that if one believes in something, they should express that belief to others. He encourages people to engage him in discussing these views. Unlike many out there who do, in fact, state that their belief is the way it is and everyone else should fall in line with that.

 

[WitchDocIsIn]

Anyway - I'm totally drifting this off topic and should probably stop rambling on that subject.

 

[Casual Distraction]

Too lazy to quote everyone so just rambling on various valid points given:

P&T being political: If you subscribe to the mindset that magic is art then political expression in magic shouldn't be a surprise.

I don't have to agree with everything P&T say to appreciate their work. I don't think they are being preachy but hoping you keep an open mind.

Danger in magic : I'd like to think people aren't hoping something goes wrong but exhibit A is NASCAR. Exhibit B is sideshow stunts like jumping over X. Exhibit C is the news as if it bleeds it leads.

Danger in magic 2 : Used to eat fire and looking back it wasn't something I'd tell my past self to do. I can get better reactions without the danger and don't need to resort to danger. But hey youth and danger are common partners so I get it. .

 

[Tower of Lunatic Meat]

I can see where Penn is coming from.

I think when Penn says that what David Blaine did is 'not art', I think he meant it as 'art that we shouldn't be encouraging'.

Let's get this out of the way. All magic IS ART. Regardless if we like it or not. From the works of The Professor down to the sponge ding-dong. It's all art.

Now. Some of you may recall that when DB first did S'treet Magic', A LOT of people took the copy-and-paste route to try and have some semblance of success in what they were doing.

I think Penn put the 'DB Bullet Catch' and impressionable magicians together and saw something that could very well hurt the magic community.

Because the new DB special was a success, I think that we are to see more young and/or impressionable magicians attempt to get, practice, and try 'risk'/geek magic.

Unfortunately, when it comes to entertainment, the envelope CONSTANTLY needs to be pushed to keep things fresh and in the people heads.

I think that what DB did was inevitable. Someone would have done something along the lines of what he did in terms or risk-taking magic. And thebaudience would eat it right up.

And now this sets up a potentially dangerous precedent with our future audiences. Hey have seen magicians do card tricks, they have seen coin tricks, etc.

Now they are going to want to see more dangerous stuff. I fear that the general audience is going to push us to where if we aren't taking risks, they won't watch.

In the end, I think Penn sees DB as more of a 'parent' in the magic community to the rest of us 'kids' and is basically saying, 'you're not setting a good example for magicians or their audiences.'

It's still art, though.

 

[Maverick85]

The problem is that Penn has performed "dangerous" tricks that, if done by somebody emulating the show, would go badly wrong. You fire an ungimmicked nailgun through your hand because you forgot the sequence, you're going to the hospital and you're probably going to lose some function in that hand. Penn speaking out against David is like a doctor who smokes. It's okay if he keeps puffing away, but you better not 'cause it's bad for you. I'm sure the nailgun is gimmicked and can't hurt him, thus this is where Penn makes his argument. I'm sure the DB trick is a gimmick too and can't hurt him. If Penn's not seeing that, I'd say it's a compliment in some form for DB because it "fooled" the guy who has a TV show about "fooling".

I'm leaning toward some of the sideshow stuff because, sadly, the possibility of red generally generates green. I'm not intensely worried about some guy going "Aw, if that little squirt can eat glass, I can too 'cause I'm bigger, stronger, and tougher" and gnawing on his wife's stemware. If he does, that's unfortunate but dumb is too common and I'm just one man. If I'd wanted to be a role model, I'd never have chosen magic. My job is to know the secret that allows me to do what seems impossible, it's not to make sure I protect people who really can't be trusted to eat with a fork. I'm responsible for nobody's stupidity but my own.

 

[Tower of Lunatic Meat]

I'm sure the DB trick is a gimmick too and can't hurt him. If Penn's not seeing that, I'd say it's a compliment in some form for DB because it "fooled" the guy who has a TV show about "fooling".

Blaine reported that he got injured by the bullet catch.

 

[Maverick85]

Blaine reported that he got injured by the bullet catch.

Yup, but he also reports to be weak and a little sick after his levitation too so I'm not sure if it's legitimate or acting skill...

A slightly lighter or heavier powder charge inside the round and you've just shot him in the face. An eighth of a grain of powder difference and it's Game Over or Blaine Over. Nobody would insure that, and nobody would finance that. .22lr are really hard to reload and prime by design so they'd have had no real option but to trust a factory for the rounds. Match grade ammo is better but it can still be inconsistent round-to-round.

I shoot AR500 steel quite often with several calibers. .22lr bullets fragment badly when they strike a hardened target and the fragments go in the most convenient direction, usually 360 degrees if not impeded. If dude's still got a nose and lips, I call it a trick that Penn fell for hook, line, and podcast. Blaine is a showman, not a moron.

 

[Tower of Lunatic Meat]

My only question is this:

Aside from bolstering his performance on his tv special, is there any other reason why he would report being sick after a levitation or being hurt by the bullet catch?

Regardless if he's telling the truth or if it's an act, we will be the ones that have to deal with the aftermath of an audience who wants to see us do riskier stuff.

While I don't think it'll get to NASCAR levels ('someone better cash or I'm gonna be pissed!'), I think that the longer magic continues to ride its wave of popularity and keep in the public view the more people will become aware of what type of tricks we do are be bored by it. "Yes, you San do stuff with cards, coins, and rings; can you pull a string from your eye? Swallow needles? Etc."

 

[Maverick85]

Good points but I'm torn on it. People have been drinking kerosene and water, regurgitating the kerosene to make fire and then water to put it out, catching bullets, eating glass, eating fire, swallowing needles, and a lot of other really stupid stunts for decades but still people are surprised by a card trick done at a high level. I'm not sure it's conditioning audiences to dismiss performers who work in the more mundane arts because there are still people who are awed to have one sponge ball placed in their hand and have two come out of their hand.

Worst case scenario, guys who live and die with cards, coins, and rings might have to get their game on and develop something more clever than the standards that audiences have already seen and can predict. It's tougher to find new ideas now because so many have been "found" but at the same time there's always the possibility of combining elements from several tricks to make an entirely new trick. A ring vanish that "morphs" into deck and the top card has a ring on it? That's not a standard trick an audience may have seen twenty times this month. A coin is lost and reappears embedded on the magician's finger like a ring. A card bursts into flame and when the fire dies it's a $5 bill. A lack of creativity will run off more audiences than a few guys doing high-level stunts. If a guy puts a rubber band on his left index finger spanned to the thumb, I already know where he's going and I have to think most audiences would too if they've ever seen much magic at all. He puts the same rubber band on his wrist, snaps his fingers, and it appears under the watchband of a spectator, I'm impressed even though I know how to do that.

 

[InFeR]

I adore both Penn and also Blaine, I think they have unique, well-sculpted styles.

As for the bullet catch and the idea of risking one's life - I can see how many people get an adrenaline rush from watching that, similar to watching a horror movie where you know it's not real but it excites you anyway.

Having said that, doing a bullet catch for REAL has absolutely no appeal to me. Imagine you strapped a helpless assistant to a wall, blindfolded him or her, and actually shot a bullet into a cup in his/her mouth. Tada! Unnecessary cruelty, yay! It's not much better when the magician does it in his/her own mouth. Doing it for real is, for me, not magic nor even interesting. Consequently, trying SO hard to make it appear as real also falls short for me and adds absolutely no value. Actually, it does the opposite and takes away from the image of the magician, and I'll explain why.

If this were a typical bullet catch passed off as real then that would be fine by me. But saying something along the lines of "all the other magicians did it as an illusion, now watch me do it for real (i.e I'm so fantastic)," is too arrogant and condenscending towards other magicians who have done and who currently do bullet catches. So I can perfectly understand why Penn is so pissed off. I would be too, if someone said my method is an illusion and his method is the real deal.

This primed Penn to go on a tirade against Blaine, but he couldn't just call Blaine out for what he really did - be an egotistical a-hole - so he was bashing the promotion of danger and "violence" in magic. I think he made some fair points about it but I don't think it's anywhere as bad as he made it out to be. I think he was just really pissed at Blaine in general.

Penn made some good points and I personally agree with his argument, but I don't think it's a catastrophe if 'stunt magic' becomes a super popular thing. It could become a fad and eventually equalize itself into the other types of magic. A magician typically doesn't perform mentalism and a spectator goes: "I don't want to see that, do a coin trick!" The magician should be setting the pace of the show and dismissing requests (if the magician doesn't want to do those things) in a funny and witty way.

Anyway, to sort of sum up what I think about this: we do magic for the effects. Doing the effect with undetectable method #1 or undetectable method #2 (assuming both are just as visually appealing and clean) makes no difference in the eyes of the spectator. Hyping up one method as real and saying or even inplying that other magicians' methods are not real is offensive to the other magicians who do it and those who did it before, so I understand that aspect of why Penn was so upset.

I personally thought the bullet catch scenes, including the build-up and all of that, was a waste of space on what could have otherwise been a better DVD.

Is it ethically wrong? No. Your body is yours to do with as you please. But to say something like "hey look those other magicians don't do it for real but I do", e.g "I actually move the card to the top with real magic, those other magicians are fooling you with double lifts", saying stuff like that, even if it were true, strikes me as mere ego-stroking and has/adds no value in the realm of magic.

Danger itself will always be entertainment to some, and though I don't find it amusing or artistic, it doesn't bother me that others do. Conclusion: Blaine is a jerk, and danger won't destroy magic.

 

[RealityOne]

All very interesting.

As for politics, I hate when people confuse celeberity for intelligence (on both sides of the political spectrum). Although Penn's views are a little more thought out than some, the vigor of his opinions sometimes has me question whether he has viewed both sides of an issue and made a determination or just came up his opinion and looked for reasons to justify it. I try to go by Steven Covey's advice to "Seek first to understand and then to be understood."

As for the bullet catch, I think Penn's issue is more the length of time and efforts that Blaine went though to "prove" that it wasn't a trick. The rehearsals, the practice shots with real bullets, the faking of the post trick injury, etc. were all done to try an heighten the perceived risk. However, that has been done before -- I think Seibit had ambulances and medics standing by when he did his sawing and between shows, the crew would pour buckets of a red liquid into the sewer drains.

I tend to agree with Penn, not because of the copy cat factor (which would exist regardless of how a bullet catch is presented) but because of the lack of entertainment value of the time spent faking the danger. Also, because, at least for me, the build-up was done in such a way that it wasn't believable. It is like trying to demonstrate that you are at risk of bodily harm using a change bag. Now, part of Penn's reaction is that Blane is known for his senseless stunts (sitting in a tree house or on a block of ice) so that may add to the believability.

Regardless, I can't stand Blaine's style with his monosylabalistic patter and the contrived audience reactions (although it was interesting to see Bryan Singer who I knew in High School). I also don't like Penn's view of magic as a medium to fool the audience. But you guys already knew that.