Top 10 Ways to Create A Strong Reaction in An Audience

In a performance of a close up magic, virtual magic, or a stage magic show and you have only a few moments, try to do at least one of 10 meaningful things to create a strong reaction in the magic performance. These are not necessarily specific magic tricks, but stick to their genres.

1. Magically alter a borrowed object.

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Anything from changing a borrowed $1 bill into a $5 bill and letting them keep it, to bending a borrowed quarter, the melting their straw with your fingers, etc.

 2. Perform something visual.

A simple color change, vanish with cards... all the way up to car through window. Cause a dollar bill to fold up by itself, or your shoelaces to tie themselves, a torn newspaper visually restores, make your tie change color, coins fly from hand to hand.

3. Do something magical in their hands.

Cause one sponge ball to multiply in a 30 little balls. Make words or numbers appear on their Palm. Cause a penny to vanish or change into a quarter in their closed fist. Melt a quarter in their hand. Make a piece of chocolate and a piece of gum change places in their hands. A piece of cut string restores in their fist, etc.

4. Make something move.

A deck of cards cuts all by itself to the selected card. A stick of gum slowly creeps out of the pack when you offer them a piece. A pin placed on the table rolls off and falls to the floor. A card slowly rises from the deck while in a carton box they are holding. I borrowed pencil slowly rises up to the sky when placed into a bottle. A fork laying on their hand moves and falls to the floor.

5.  Make something vanish and appear in an impossible location.

A borrowed bill is burnt to ashes and appears inside a lemon. I signed playing card is rubbed away to nothing at appears under their drink. A playing card is signed, vanishes, and appears in a sealed envelope.  A borrowed ring vanishes and appears inside of a walnut. I borrowed coin vanishes in a flash of fire, and appears inside a nest of wallets. A borrowed cellphone vanishes and appears inside a loaf of bread.

6.  Tell them something they merely thought of.

Reveal their telephone number, a friend's name, a favorite color, food etc. That they have written down and not shown to anyone. Tell them where they're thinking of from a borrowed book. Revealed our thought of card, tell them which hand they are holding a coin, reveal to them their birthday or astrological sign.

7.  Give them an interesting or impossible object as a souvenir.

A bent and twisted fork, a playing card with two cards melted together, a penny morphed with a nickel, two pretzels linked together, a bent wine glass, a coin stuck in a bottle, etc.

8.  Produce something amazing and unexpected.

Perhaps a refreshing ice-cold drink, a giant rock the size of your foot from your shoe, and ice cream cone from your pocket, any unexpected object, a small animal or child, a giant block of ice, hundreds of butterflies, etc.

9.  Predict something that will happen at the event in the newspaper, or on Facebook, or Twitter.

Reveal what card they're thinking of in the local newspaper that day. You reveal a picture of the city they are thinking of on your Facebook page posted the day before. You predict an audience members favorite car, and vacation destination with a Twitter post seconds before the effect started.

10.  Be sneaky before the show.

If you can get into the room before the audience, you can do things like place a force card under a tablecloth or inside a sugar packet. Find out a person's name, write it on the back of a car to be forced, load someone's outer pocket with a force card, a coin or other object. You can vanish a duplicate and have them reach in their pocket to reveal it. Find out their birthday, have them write down their name, or the paper and perform ashes on arm to reveal their birthday. Any pre-show info you have can be used to feed back to them during revelations if you are performing as a mentalist.